


Rose Water

by kamidontarchive



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: Angst, Canon, Drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-02-14
Updated: 2006-02-12
Packaged: 2018-12-27 02:49:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 27
Words: 78,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12072069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kamidontarchive/pseuds/kamidontarchive
Summary: Justin deals with his problems. Can Brian help or will he make things worse?





	1. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:**

> Note from IrishCaelan, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Brian_Justin_Fanfiction_Archive). To preserve the archive, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in September 2017. I posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [The Brian/Justin Fanfiction Archive collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/bjfic/profile).

Friday / Saturday Morning...

‘The end of the day is dragging on and on. I think I might have died about twenty minutes ago. Oh my GOD, is she still talking? How much do we need to know about the Revolutionary war, damn,’ I think as I sit in class. It’s still hot as shit outside and they haven’t turned the air conditioner on. I am going to sweat to death; my head is sticking to my desk where I have had it for the whole time she has been talking. I glance over at the clock. ‘Ten more minutes,’ I think as I look toward the front of the class where Mrs. Lawson is still talking. She is still talking but I have Charlie Browned her; I can’t understand anything she says. I see her stop talking and look at the clock. The bell is ringing, thank god. I get up from my seat and grab my uniform jacket and my books. 

“Hey,” Daphne says as I walk out the door. I jump back and almost slam into the door as it is closing behind me.

“Fuck Daphne, you scared the shit out of me,” I curse as I right myself and fix the books back into a secure position.

“Sorry,” she offers. “So, what are you doing today? It is Friday after all,” she says as we make our way down the hall to our respective lockers. I shrug my shoulders; I never really did much of anything.

“I don’t know, probably paint and draw or something,” I say as we get to my locker first. I know better than to not pay attention to details, I know that only studying the landscape is what gets people in trouble. “I can’t go out cause my parents are going out and I have to watch Molly,” I say just as the door to my locker slams closed, missing my hand by a fraction of an inch. Fucking goddamn Shaun Peters, I never even saw him coming. He is the detail.

“Taylor, I see you’re hanging with your little bitch again,” he says as he pushes me hard into the locker. The noise bounces off the walls in the now deserted hallway. I am trying so hard not to let him see the pain he is causing as the master lock digs into my back and his palm presses into my chest, there will almost certainly be a mark.

“Yeah, I see you’re hanging with yours too,” I say as I nod toward Brad and Jeffery. Brad is looking at Daphne like she is a piece of meat. “but I guess you need to have someone around all the time so you can take care of that cocksucking problem you seem to have,” I press as I give him a little smirk. He is as gay as the day is long and I knew that even before he sucked my dick. I watch the blood and anger flow through Shaun’s body; he is turning a beautiful, sexy under any other circumstance, shade of red. 

The fist that connects with my body doesn’t register until it reaches back and makes contact with my jaw. I can feel the coppery taste invade my senses as he punches me again and my body kisses the floor hello. 

“Fucking ASSHOLE,” I say as they all walked away, turning the corner and making their way out the building. Daphne bends down to help me up and I see her eyes travel to my right jaw. ‘Great,’ I think.

“How bad is it this time?” I ask.

“Not as bad as last time but it is just starting to swell so you’ll just have to wait and see. We should go and get some ice,” she says as she helps me to my feet. I shake my head, fuck ice, my dad is gonna be pissed. We walk out the doors after Daphne grabs her stuff and I spit the extra blood that is pooling in my mouth into the nearby grass.

“I need to stop at the drug store before I go home,” I say hoping that she will take the hint and go home without me, but, she doesn’t. 

“What for?” she asks as we turn toward the drug store, it is only a couple of blocks so we can walk.

“Nothing special, I just want to get some more drawing pencils,” I tell her. We reach the store in record time and walk through the doors. It is so cool inside, nice change from the heat. I like the winter. When we get inside Daphne heads straight to the make-up aisle, I head toward the aisle with the pencils and wait until Daphne is really occupied. I slip from the aisle after picking up new pencils and walk toward the grooming products, I am moving fast. I stand in front of the straight razors and pick up a pack, stuffing it into my bag. I love this drug store it is old school, no cameras. I am just zipping up my bag when Daphne shows up.

“What are you doing? Let’s go, I gotta be home soon,” she says as she turns and walks to the front of the store. I swing the bag around so that it is in the back of me and follow her to the checkout. I throw my pencils on the counter and pay; declining a bag I scoop them up and place them in my pocket. We walk the short distance back to our neighborhood and I say bye to Daphne when she reaches her house. 

I walk the rest of the way to my house alone, swimming in my head. I stop at the end of the driveway and look at the front door, it seems so far away. I trudge up the driveway thinking ‘Dead man walking.’ I unlock the door and push inside, hearing silence I think just maybe luck is on my side. I hear my father call my name right as my foot touches the bottom step. ‘Damn that luck, she is such a BITCH,’ I think. I take my foot off the step and point it in the direction of the living room. 

My dad is sitting there drinking a beer. “Justin, your mother and I are going to leave at six so you have a little bit of time before you have to watch Molly, okay?” he says. I nod my head, being careful to only show him the left side of my face, creating a profile. “Justin, would you please look over here, you’re not taking a prison photo.” I turn my body to face him fully. 

“HOLY SHIT,” he screams as he jumps up and takes my chin in his hand, turning my face so that he can get a better look. It must look worse than it did an hour ago.

“Who did this to your face?” he asks. 

“It doesn’t matter who did it,” I answer back.

“Jesus Justin, you’ve got to start taking care of yourself. I mean if you let people beat you up they will, don’t be so weak all the time,” he says as he lets me go and ventures into the kitchen shaking his head at the shame of having such a weak son. I pick up the little pride that I have left and sling it over my shoulder as I head back up the stairs. I close the door to my bedroom and flop back on the bed, my bag and uniform jacket occupying the space next to me. I close my eyes and for a brief moment I see Shaun’s fist and bolt upright. I grab my bag and head into my bathroom, closing and locking the door behind me. I sit on the floor, back leaning against the tub and pull out a small safe box from my bag. I reach around my neck and pull on the chain until the key becomes available. I pull it off my neck and open the box. It is filled with small bottles of hydrogen peroxide, alcohol, cotton swabs, bandages, gauze, a couple of small towels and many tubes of ointment. 

I get the new pack of razors out my bag and tear the box off. The little carrying case they come in keep me loyal to the brand. I pull out one razor and sit it on my folded leg; the rest going into the box. I pull out a towel and some hydrogen peroxide. When I have everything ready I tear off my uniform top, white and blood don’t mix and the blood from my mouth is gonna be enough of a bitch to remove, it doesn’t need to have company. 

I choose a spot on the inside of my right arm; my legs are running out of room. I touch the thin, sharp blade to my skin and the feeling that flows through me is amazing. It feels just like the first time, when I was fifteen and my dad was yelling at my mom about why she let me join the art club. I could hear them screaming from my bathroom.  
 _  
“He is going to grow up to be a fucking fairy Jen,” he shouted.  
_  
It was an accident then, I was playing around with the razor and gripped it too hard when my dad shouted and broke the serenity. I welcomed the pain and the released tension; they came to be great friends. 

This time and the times that followed after that were not accidents. My blood is running cold, the pain and tension feels great as it seeps out of me. I am controlling the pain and control is wonderful. I watch the slivers of blood as they make their way onto the towel that I have positioned for just such a purpose. When I finally feel the last bit of pain leave me I drop the blade and push the towel onto the wound, stopping the flow. I wait until most of the blood has stopped flowing and drench the wound in hydrogen peroxide, white foams from the wound and I close my eyes and lay back, enjoying the oblivion.

“Justin, are you okay?” she asks as she knocks on the door. I open my eyes a little and look around, and then I remember where I am and start to sit up.

“Yeah,” I answer her as I cover the wound in a bandage and put all my supplies away. I push the box into my school bag and return the key to its place around my neck. I open the door and come face to face with my mother. I smile brightly and close the door behind me.

“Your father told me that someone beat you up,” she says as she tries not to be overly emotional. I have told her how much it bothers me.

“Hey mom, I guess I just lost track of time and no one beat me up. It was just a little misunderstanding,” I say as I drop my bag on the floor and move to my closet, keeping my arm out of her sight. I start stripping out of the rest of my uniform as she follows me. “What? Did you want something?”

“Yeah, your father and I are getting ready to leave. Molly is in her room and there is a pizza on the counter,” she says as she looks at my slightly flushed skin. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine,” I tell her with a weary look as I slip on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. She just gives me a little smile and kisses my cheek, brushing the hair out my face. I plaster a smile on as she turns to leave my room. I sit down on the bed and wait for the front door to close and the sound of the car as it pulls away before grabbing a cigarette and walking downstairs and through the kitchen toward the back door. Molly is sitting in front of the television fully engrossed in cartoons and eating pizza. “I’m going in the backyard,” I say to her as I make my way out of the house, grabbing a slice of pizza on my way.

**  
“Don’t you think Justin is a little too weak Jen?” Craig asks his wife. He is becoming more and more concerned about their son and more importantly he is becoming more and more concerned about how his son is reflecting on him.

“He isn’t weak, he is artistic and sensitive. That’s not the same a being weak, he’s… just not… a fighter,” she says as she looks at Craig and then back down at her menu.

“I think that maybe I should spend some time with him, you know, man to man,” he says firmly, more to himself than to Jennifer.

“Yeah, maybe you should. He might appreciate it.”

‘Yeah, maybe I should,’ he thinks.

**  
“Molly, go the fuck to bed. Mom and Dad said you had to go to sleep by 11p.m.,” I tell her. I am trying so hard to keep my temper in check. I am starting to lose control and I don’t like the feeling. 

“Molly, NOW,” I yell again, maybe the third time really is a charm. I watch as she slides off the couch and heads toward her bedroom. ‘Ugh, fucking sisters.’

I check all the locks after I flick through a few channels and head to bed myself. I go into the bathroom and pick up the shirt and the towel, placing them both into the dirty clothes hamper. I climb into bed and pull the covers over my head welcoming nothingness, at least I hope so.  
 __  
‘I cannot believe that bitch Mrs. Carlson got me put in in-school suspension. Recommending that she take the stick out her ass to remove the pressure was not over the top,’ I think as I sit at the table alone in the quiet room. I can hear the clock ticking and I can smell the heat. God I cannot wait until winter hits this fucking place. I see the door start to open and I grab my pencil, pretending to work. I watch, without making it obvious that I am watching, as Mr. McCord brings that asshole Shaun Peters into the room, holding him by his jacket collar.

_“Get your fucking hands off me, asshole,” he yells as he fights to get free from the 6’2” teacher. Mr. McCord ignores his cries as he dumps him, quite unceremoniously into the chair on the other side of the table._

_“I suggest you adjust your attitude or you’ll be looking at these four walls for the entire week,” he says as he walks back to the door. “Do your class work and stay in that seat,” he says as he closes the door, leaving us both in silence, the isolated room serving as the landscape. We both sit there in silence, me pretending to draw, him waiting for me to acknowledge him._

_‘Fuck him if he thinks I have any desire to talk to him. We have never gotten along. Since fifth grade we haven’t liked each other, no real reason, we just don’t, life is like that sometimes,’ I think as I turn the page of my science book. I see him move forward and place him arms on the desk and before I can react he snatches the book and throws it behind him. “What is wrong with you?” I ask as I get up and walk behind him bending down to get the book, never seeing him take in my ass, more landscape._

_“Don’t you ever get tired of studying all the time?” he asks as he pushes back and places his feet on the desk._

_I pause before sitting, “Don’t you ever get tired of acting like an ass?” I counter. I sit down in a huff and place the closed book on the desk, wiping the invisible dirt off the front and the back. I cross my arms and look at him, he is staring at me._

_“Maybe sometimes,” he whispers. I smile a little as some of the tension dissipates. “So, what the fuck are you in here for?” he asks. I guess the lovely moment has passed._

_“I told Mrs. Carlson to get the stick out her ass,” I tell him. He let out the loudest laugh I have ever heard from him in all our years at school together. “What about you?”_

_“Oh, I got caught smoking a joint in the east hallway,” he says as he takes his feet off the desk and stands up. He is looking out the window and I can smell him, he smells like pure sex… man, I could just lick him._

_“What?” I hear him ask._

_“Nothing,” I answer as I try to wipe the drool away from my mouth without him seeing me do it. I see him smirk at me and I start to laugh on the inside. I pick my pencil back up and start to sketch him; I don’t even think I am aware that I am doing it. I am working feverishly when he snatches it from me and holds it up to the window so he can see it in the light._

_“Nice drawing, I didn’t know you were so talented. Although, I am not naked right now,” he says as he sits on the desk in front of me, spreading his legs open so that I am forced to sit facing his crotch. He leans forward, hands resting on the edge of the table and pulls my chair toward him with his feet. I let him because I am seventeen and really horny._

_‘No fucking way this is happening, a teacher can walk in at anytime,’ I think as he leans in close to my face. I had no idea I was drawing him naked._

_“Has anybody ever told you how beautiful you are?” he asks me, so softly I can almost have an orgasm from the tone of his voice alone._

_“Shut up, I am not beautiful and if you think I am so beautiful why don’t you act like it,” I ask him. He looks at me like I just grew a second head._

_“Because,” he says in reply. I shrug my shoulders and accept that that is all he plans on giving as an explanation. I start to ask him another question when he crashes his lips down on mine, I can feel the heat start from the pit of my stomach and spread through all my organs. I am shaking with anticipation as he pulls me up and out of the seat, placing his hands on my hips. I am lost in him. I open my mouth to accommodate his tongue and I can taste the flavor of the lingering drug. We pull ourselves apart from each other and for a moment neither one of us says a word._

_“Damn, that was unexpected,” I say as I linger in front of his face, close enough to kiss him again. I watch the lust as it runs behind his eyes, dancing with excitement._

_“Yeah, very unexpected,” he says as he pulls me back to him and starts to kiss my neck, licking and sucking like a leech, if a teacher walks in now I will be in shits creek because I don’t think I could stop if I wanted to. I feel his hand leave my hip and start to snake around to the front of my jeans, rubbing my now stiff cock through the fabric. I can feel the other hand leave its place and join the other, both working together to release the offensive button. I feel the zipper start its slow decline and the warm hand as it makes its way down…  
_  
“Justin, Justin…mommy said to get up now, she said you’ve been sleep long enough,” I hear Molly say as I open my eyes slowly and take the covers from over my head. I groan as I feel the nice hard cock that the dream has given me, thankful that I have the covers firmly pulled up and am laying face down.

“What time is it?” I ask.

“It’s almost noon, mommy said to tell you to get up, she said daddy wants to talk to you,” she says as she opens a sketchbook and starts looking at the pictures.

“Molly, close that and go to your own room,” I say as I pull the covers back over my head. I wait until I hear her leave before getting up and walking to my bathroom. I turn on the shower so it can get warm while I take a piss. I brush my teeth afterwards and throw my clothes off, I step under the warm spray and sink into myself. Fifteen minutes later I get out and get dressed, snapping on the wrist cuff that holds extra blades to complete the outfit. I walk out of my room, on the hunt for food. I get to the kitchen and slow my steps when I see my dad sitting at the table with his back to me.

“Good morning,” I say as I edge my way into the kitchen. I grab the orange juice and a muffin off the counter before sitting at the table with him. He looks up at me and stares at the bruise on my face, he is silent.

“Did your mother tell you I wanted to talk to you?” he asks finally. The paper he is reading is starting to tear a little where he is gripping it. I have a not so good feeling about this talk.

“No, she told Molly to tell me,” I say quietly. “Why? What’s wrong?” I squeak out and before I can take my next breath I see four of my sketchbooks come flying toward me, I did not even see where they came from. One comes to rest on the stove behind me, the other on the floor and two of them fall in front of me. One of them is open and I can see the nude pictures and the boys names scribbled on the paper. My breath just stilled.

Thirty minutes later I am laying on the grass on the other side of the park, hidden from view and wiping the tears that flow from my eyes, trying desperately to slow my heart down and stop the quaking that is ripping through my body.

I close my eyes, searching for my sanity. I can still see the glass of orange juice as he threw it into the wall, streaks of orange ran down to the floor like they too were trying to escape. I can still see the shards of paper as they too ran from the fury, the madness. I lift my right arm in front of my face and remove a blade from the leather cuff.   
__  
“You are the biggest fucking disappointment in my life,” he stated will a bitterness that stilled my heart.  
  
I drag the blade along the length of my left arm… pain management.


	2. Rose Water

Thank you to Carly for all her beta help on this chapter.

* * *

Saturday / Mid-Morning...

 

I can feel the blood as it trickles down my arm with reckless abandon. I open my eyes and the sky is rapidly changing colors, from dark reds to the brightest of white. My head is spinning, spinning without movement. I look down at my arm and quickly realize that I have cut too deep, in my anger and sadness I have cut too deep. I look around and see that I have nothing to stop the flow of blood. I place my hand over the wound, pressing tightly and wincing at the pain as I rise up onto my knees. “Shit, fucking shit,” I say as I realize that I can’t stop the blood this time. I push onto my feet and start to walk; halfway there I know that I am not going to make it walking. I sit down on a bench and pull out my cell phone. Thank god I have it. I dial the familiar number and wait.

“Hello,” I hear Daphne say. I can hear the gum as it rolls around in her mouth and for a second I forget why I am calling. 

“Hell...oooo?” I hear her sing-song.

“Daphne, it’s me, do you think you can come by Arbor Park and pick me up?” I ask her. “I’ll explain later,” I add, anticipating her next question.

“Yeah, sure, I’ll be there in a few minutes,” she says and I can already hear her moving to put her shoes on.

“Thanks,” I say before flipping the phone closed. I feel my eyes trying to close and a chill washing over me as I sit on the bench.

“Hey, are you okay?” I hear a woman ask, she has on a long orange coat that for some reason is the funniest thing in the world to me. 

“I’m fine,” I say, knowing the whole time that it is a lie. I know she is watching the blood as it soaks my shirt and jeans. I know she is watching the small droplets as they join together to stain the cement with my DNA. I know she can see the old bruise on the side of my face and the blood that is cascading from just above my temple and the wonderfully fresh spilt lip, courtesy of one Craig Taylor. I tuck the offending lip into my mouth and rape the stinging wound with my tongue, more pain management. 

“You don’t look too good, are you sure you’re okay?” she asks again. I start to say something when I see Daphne’s car come around the corner. When Daphne stops at the curb I just give the woman a nice smile and a nod before trying to stand and make my way to the car. After the third try I manage to make it to my feet, walking slowly over to Daphne’s car and opening the door, the woman watching worriedly.

“Holy shit Justin, what the hell is going on?” she asks. I pull the door closed behind me and take in a deep breath.

“Not now okay, can you just take me to the hospital, please?” I say, looking over at her, my eyes pleading. She nods her head and pulls away from the curb. Mercy Hospital here we come.

**

“What happened to the kitchen?” I ask as I come in and set the groceries on the counter, avoiding the glass, paper and various other kitchen appliances and utensils that are scattered everywhere. I wait for some sort of answer from Craig but he says nothing. I reach into the bag and get the milk. 

Turning to put it away I see the front of the refrigerator; drops of blood decorate the front, not much... but blood just the same. I feel the milk slip from my fingers and hit the floor with a thud, liquid seeping from its belly. 

“Craig, what is going on?”

“Me and Justin had a little talk,” is all he offers. I look at him with multiple questions stinging behind my eyes. 

“What about?”

“This stupid fucking art shit, about him being so weak, about him drawing nude pictures of guys and writing their names in his fucking sketch pads like he is some kinda fag or something,” he tells me, slowly and in a monotone voice as if it is the most normal thing in the whole entire world. “But he wouldn’t listen, so I had to tell him a little more firmly, in a little more man to man way. I had to put it all into perspective for him,” he says as his eyes finally look up and meet mine and I know there is more to the story than what he is saying.

I look back at the blood and then at the slight shine that is glazing over my husband’s eyes and for the first time since I have known him I feel a little stirring in the pit of my stomach, not quite fear but the strange tingling that courses through you when you are not quite as sure as you thought you were... the unwanted combination of anticipation and doubt. I force myself to speak, swallowing my anxiety, “Where is Justin?”

“He had to get out and get a little air, I am sure he’s fine. He has a lot of thinking to do,” he says as he stands up from the table and walks out of the kitchen. I look down at the table and see the sketchbooks, some ripped clear in half lying on the table, soaked in what smells like beer. I back away from the table and search my purse for my cell phone, there are secrets in this room and I want to know them all. I start to dial the number for Justin’s phone. The wait seems like forever, I am about to give up when I hear a click and the invitation to leave a voicemail.

**

I can feel the vibration in my pocket as I sit in the back of the emergency room. I pluck the phone from the dark abyss of my pocket and look at the display. I see the number and am tempted for one moment to answer it but I don’t, I shove it back into my pocket and wait for the doctor to come back with the supplies he needs to stitch up my arm, they were finally able to get the bleeding to stop, so now I am waiting for them to put me back together. Daphne is in the waiting room and I know questions are popping off like bullets in her brain. I straighten up as the door opens and the doctor comes in with a tray full of supplies.

“How did you do this to your arm?” the doctor asks me and I answer him with a nice big dose of silence, I have no intention of telling him my problems and getting sent to some fucking juvenile facility and forced to see a shrink. “Okay, I guess I can take the silence as the clue that you’re not going to be talking to me anytime soon,” he says as he finishes patching me up. I work my way out and past the nurse’s station after he is done and Daphne is on her feet in no time. I have already taken care of the insurance information so we are free to leave.

“So, tell me what happened, and start from the beginning,” Daphne says as we are walking out the doors. 

I tell her everything, everything except what exactly happened in the kitchen. I am not ready to talk about that yet. 

Three hours later we are sitting in the Pittsburgh Museum of Modern Art leaning against the wall beside the abstract paintings. 

“So, that’s everything,” I say.

“That’s not everything, I know you Justin, and that’s far from everything,” she says as she pulls her legs up onto the bench and wraps her arms around them. She lays her head on top of her knees and looks over at me. “But, I’ll take what I can get.”

“Thanks,” I say. We hear someone approaching our sanctified area and we lower our voices a little more. “God damn,” I breathe as the tall brunet comes around the corner, talking quietly to a tall blonde woman. I know the woman works here, I have been coming here long enough to know that but the brunet I have not seen before. I can feel the moisture leave my mouth and I can also feel the heat as it travels through my belly and right down to my cock. I let out a small gasp as a shiver flows through me and I hear Daphne let out a little laugh.

“Yeah,” she says, agreeing with my unspoken thoughts.

‘You have no idea,’ I think as the man turns and locks his hazel eyes with mine.


	3. Rose Water

AN: Thank you to Carly for helping me get through this chapter, and for reading it over and over and over again.

* * *

Saturday Afternoon…

I don’t know how many times we are going to have this conversation. I am starting to feel like I have paid to hear this bullshit. “I told you already Lindsay, I really don’t want to have another kid,” I tell her as we move from the confidential comfort of her office to the vast expanse of space that is the museum. 

“I know but that was a while ago, I thought you might feel differently now that Gus is about to turn two,” she says. I feel her slip her arm around my back and I know my resolve is breaking. “Could you just give it a little more thought before you close the book completely?” she asks. I turn my head and give her a smirk.

“Fine, I’ll _think_ about it,” I tell her. She kisses my cheek and I blush on the inside, cherishing the feeling of friendship and love. Needing more.

“That’s all I’m asking for,” she says smiling. God, I just know I am going to end up caving. 

We walk through the Museum, Lindsay pointing out different pieces. I am so fucking bored, and she knows it, but she shows me anyway. As I turn to look at another piece I see the most piercing set of blue eyes connect with mine, they burn with fear, knowing, uncertainty, passion... and pain.

I stare at him, memorizing every inch. I see the bruises and the bandages and then… they vanish, leaving only skin that resembles untouched bone china. The kind your mom has locked behind a layer of glass and displayed in the dining room. I feel Lindsay touch my shoulder and I direct my brain’s attention to her but my eyes never leave the swirling pools of blue. I feel her lean a little closer to me and start to speak, “I see you have spotted our very own piece of living art,” she says with a sort of sugary tone to her voice. 

“Does he come here a lot?” I ask her. I do not _want_ to ask about the blond enigma, but I feel as if I _have_ to. 

“Yeah, he is always here. He has been coming in more and more lately,” Lindsay says, her face still facing the painting. My eyes have not left the younger man’s.

“Have you ever talked to him?” 

“No, whenever anybody tries he just gives one word answers until they fuck off,” she whispers. “It’s sad really,” she says. “He seems like a really smart young man.”

I nod my head and blink. It seems like ages since I have last performed the function. I blink again and the beautiful blond is gone, leaving an almost ethereal feeling in his wake. A feeling that lets you know it is not your last encounter. 

**

“Thanks Daph…for everything,” I say as I move to get out of the car. I look at the bandage on my arm and I know it will be impossible to hide it from my mom. Not to mention the one on my head and the split lip. I can’t stop licking it.

“Anytime, are you sure you’re okay? Do you need anything?” she asks me. I shake my head no. I can hear the questions that are _really_ dying to escape from between her lips, “Is he depressed? How long has he been doing it? Why didn’t I see it? How much do I really know about him?” 

I push the door closed and watch as she pulls away from the curb and continues down the street and around the corner, to the sanity of her own house. I turn toward my house and for one brief second it smiles at me. Not warm and inviting but sinister… evil. It’s the look that you receive from someone who harbors a terrible secret that has everything to do with you. I take a deep breath and for a moment I can feel my blood pump through my wounds, and the pain is sweet. I open the door and step through, placing my keys back into my pocket. 

“Justin, are you okay? Where have you been?” I hear my sister ask as she takes a look at my face. “What happened to your face, and your arm?” she asks as the door closes, sealing me in.

“I had to go out for a little while,” I say ignoring her last question. I take a tentative step toward the stairs, waiting for my presence to cause the house to swell and collapse. “Where are mom and Craig?” I ask. I can’t bring my lips to form the word dad and it hurts. Somewhere deep inside it hurts.

“Dad is in the basement and mom is in the kitchen,” she says. I nod my head slowly and start the climb to my room. The stairs are swaying beneath me like I am floating on water and the door seems unbelievably far away. I reach my door finally and rest my head against it, steadying myself. I turn the knob and open the door. 

The entire room is destroyed, all my drawings are ruined. Clothes and other items are peppering the floor. I close the door behind me. I am too tired to put up a fight, too tired to care, just too tired. I step toward the bed when I see my book bag underneath a shirt, I move toward it with the speed of a lion. I grab the bag and search frantically inside for the box. I find it and wrap my hand around it tightly, pulling it out and clutching it to my chest. 

“I am losing it. I need to get a fucking grip,” I tell myself as I take the box and lay back on the bed. I close my eyes and try to pull myself back together. “You have to control the pain. Don’t let the pain control you,” I whisper. I close my eyes and fall into darkness.  
 _  
“What the fuck is this?” he asks me. I want to answer him. I want to scream, to shout at him. I want to tell him that I love dick. That I have always loved dick and I always will. I want to say all those things but I don’t. This fight isn’t about that, it’s about my art. The rational part of my brain thinks about what I would do if he kicks me out. What would I do? I have nothing of my own. I look at the remnants of my art books and I think. “I said what the fuck is it?”_

_“Sketchpads,” I offer, unwilling to test the waters. I watch as the colors of fury take their place behind his eyes. I watch as he swallows the bitter shame that is creeping under his skin and up his throat. I watch him. I have never **watched** my father, I have seen him but never watched him. I never gave him much thought, he was just my dad. Now, I see something, something else.  
_  
I open my eyes five hours later and look at the clock. 6:00 p.m., I wish it was later. I want to close the book on this day. Seal it up and bury it beneath a layer of memories. 

**

I slide the loft door open and step inside, pausing for a moment. I turn around and close the heavy door and it clicks into place noisily, sealing in the silence. I walk across the hardwood and remove my coat, tossing it lazily toward the sofa. I step up into the bedroom and lay back on the bed after removing my shirt. I think back to the museum, to the blue eyes, and the secrets that they seem to harbor. I want to go back, to ask more questions. I want to know him but I am also hesitant. “What the hell,” I tell myself. “I have always done what I wanted, why change now?” I say as I close my eyes and take in the silence. I am getting tired of silence. 

I drift off to sleep and before I am enveloped in the depths of my subconscious I see the blue swirls appear in my mind, offering a quiet sort of comfort. 

Hours later I wake up and stretch my limbs, groaning with the movements. “6:00 in the afternoon, great,” I say as I push off the bed and go to relieve myself. I finish the necessary task and go to get a bottle of water. As I stand in front of the refrigerator I realize that I have no food. I release the door and allow it to swing close on its own, the noise a suctioning thud. I turn slightly and see the answering machine light blinking urgently. I groan inwardly and step toward it. I push the button and wait.  
 _  
“Brian…Brian, if you’re there pickup the phone. Come on Brian. Shit, look, an emergency has popped up and I need you to watch Gus. I’ll explain when I get there,” she says before the machine clicks off, signaling the end of her message.  
_  
“Shit, I wonder when she left that,” I say to the empty loft as the machine beeps and spouts out its extra information.  
 __  
“4:30 p.m., end of messages.”  
  
I am saved from thinking by the pounding on the door, like a slightly muffled gong. I move toward the door and slide it open. Lindsay is standing there with bags hanging off of her and a very cranky Gus. Her face is flushed and tears have obviously been telling her cheeks about all of their adventures.

“Did you get my message?” she asks as she moves through the door. I take Gus from her as he starts to slide out of her arms along with the bags. She takes my silence as a green light. “I am sorry to do this to you Brian, I know its last minute,” she says in one breath. “I need to leave Gus with you. My parents were in an accident at their new place in Washington State. I have to go there and find out what’s going on,” she tells me as she fumbles through her purse, desperately searching for something. 

I watch her movements and place Gus on the floor. When he has gained the little balance he has I release his hand and pull Lindsay close to me. I feel her tears as they rip into my chest, penetrating my heart. I don’t cry. Somebody somewhere would say that it’s rude not to cry. They would tell me to offer the emotionally supportive tears. Fuck that.

“You don’t have to apologize or explain. You just go do what you have to do, we’ll be fine,” I tell her as I release her. She nods her head as she retrieves a crumpled piece of paper from the dark cavity of her purse.

“These are all my contact numbers and his doctors number and daycare number and,” she says as I cut her off. 

“Lindsay, I am quite capable of reading. I know all the numbers and I have an identical list,” I tell her. “Plus, Melanie is still here. I can call her if I need anything,” I say.

Lindsay gives me a weak smile and kisses Gus on the cheek and me on the lips before moving toward the door. I know she hates talking about Melanie. They never could get it together after I refused to give up my parental rights. I have never denied that Melanie is one of his parents but I was not going to budge on the issue, it’s one of the smartest things I have done so far. I shut the loft door behind her. I lift Gus up higher in my arms and watch as he looks at me. 

“What is going on?” he seems to ask. I walk over to the futon cushion and deposit him on the top, turning to get him a toy. When I turn back around, toy in hand, it is only to discover that Gus is now planted firmly on the top of my glass coffee table. I walk over and remove him.

“Maybe we should put your playpen up,” I say as I carry him over to the pile of stuff Lindsay has deposited onto the floor. I look through the bags and it is painfully obvious that there is not a playpen in the heap. 

“Shit, well, looks like we are going to the store. There is no way you are going to destroy my place,” I say as I look at Gus. I feel a genuine love radiate from him.

**  
Sunday Night…

There is a quiet tension lurking in the house with us, breathing our air and amplifying our pain. I have been playing the quiet game with Craig since I came down to dinner on Saturday night. He insisted I come down; I didn’t eat. I couldn’t. I am sitting now, waiting for the night to reject me. I am waiting for the darkness to tell me I don’t belong. I watch every car as it goes by, secure in my spot under the overpass. Secure in knowing nothing at all, nothing goes through my mind. Right here, right now, I have no worries. Tomorrow is another story.


	4. Rose Water

Carly… thank you, thank you, thank you for all your help and for listening to me go through my overly dramatic moments of insanity as I tried to finish this chapter.

* * *

Late Sunday Night… Monday…

I walk into the house and come face to face with Craig as he is coming down the stairs. We lock eyes and the world stops spinning on its axis. We both breathe deeply as the distance between us grows. “Where the fuck have you been?” he asks me. 

I answer him with silence, deep and resounding, the kind of silence that follows after an announcement of death. I watch him watching me, waiting for me to answer. He moves toward me and I move toward the stairs. We are circling each other like male animals in the wild, neither one wanting to back down. “I asked you a question,” he says. We stop moving. I look at him and smile. I have no idea why, but I smile, just a small one. 

“I went out for a while,” I say as I look into his eyes. I pull my bottom lip into my mouth and bite down hard. I am swallowing the words that want to join us in this dance of dominance. I see his mouth open to say something else but before he can I turn my back on him and his bullshit and walk up the stairs. I close myself inside my room and wait for the dawning of tomorrow. I can feel my lids getting heavy as I listen to the rhythm of my own heartbeat; Detail.

Too soon I see sun pouring through my dreams. I close my eyes tighter, willing away the inevitability of the day. When I am sure that I cannot sleep through today I open one eye and then the other. I am still in my bed, in my house…in my life. I push the covers off and walk to the bathroom, stopping to listen to the sounds of my parents and sister as they move around outside my door. I close the door firmly and walk toward the toilet, voiding my bladder and flushing it; Landscape. 

I strip free of my clothes and I feel weightless. I resist the urge to exam myself in the mirror and get into the shower. Why look? I know the bruises and bandages are there. The water is not quite hot and it’s not completely cold. It’s neutral, that temperature that manipulates you into twisting the hot water knob, knowing that it’s already all the way on. I grab the soap and make quick work of getting washed. I dry off and grab a clean uniform, slipping into it easily. I grab my book bag and fling the strap over my head. I listen by the door and when I am sure I hear nothing I open it and head down the stairs and out the front door. I have pure freedom…until this afternoon anyway. I walk the distance to Saint James alone. 

I reach the school and climb the stone steps where Daphne is waiting for me. “Hey,” she says. "I would have walked with you." I know she is dying to ask me how I feel. I don’t feel shit. I look over at her and allow my attitude to soften a little. 

“I felt like being alone,” I tell her as we walk into the building. I throw everything into my locker and grab the books that I need. We head off toward our respective classes; time to focus.

Halfway through biology and I am staring at the diagram for the frog dissection with interest. I listen as Mr. Hammond talks about the anatomy and reproductive system. I listen as he talks… I listen. I listen as he tells us to begin. I pick up the scalpel and press it into the flesh of the small creature, marveling at the ease in which it cuts and the delicate incisions it leaves behind. I continue to cut into the frog and when Mr. Hammond tells us to start cleaning up I realize that I have been staring at the scalpel for the past thirty minutes. I take the scalpel and place the protective plastic back on it and wrap it in a paper towel, inserting it into my pocket; Comfort.

I move through the rest of the day in silence, only answering when I have to. The teachers don’t seem to notice, hell, no one seems to notice. If only that was the case with Shaun. Shaun notices everything and anything that is none of his fucking business. 

When the hallways are less crowded and the teachers are otherwise occupied I walk out of the building. I have no desire to be in school today so I am taking a sabbatical, I feel as if I almost deserve it. The sunlight hits my face and I take a deep breath. I take one look back at the school and walk down the back stairs and across the grass. I sit at the bus stop and stare at the flattened gum spots on the ground, they are old and faded. I stare at them and wonder if the people who spit out gum ever feel an ounce of guilt about what they did, disposing of gum in such a public arena, leaving it to fight its own war. 

I see the bus pull up in front of me and I hesitate. I really wasn’t intending to get on the bus it was just a nice place to sit. “What the fuck,” I say to myself. Nothing is as sweet as a new adventure, right? I search for the correct change and board the bus. I have no idea where I am going and right now that seems like the greatest feeling in the world. 

**

I get in my car and head back to the house. Why bother staying at work? I have not been able to think straight since I came home on Saturday. I am worried about my family; it all seems to be falling apart. Everything changed this weekend, I could feel it. I watched Justin sit at the table not eating and my heart broke. I have not spoken to him. He won’t speak to anyone, except Molly. I pull the car to a stop in the garage and for a few minutes I am frozen. I sit in the car listening to the engine relax itself. I smell the faint reminder of an air freshener and the warm smell of heated leather rising from the seats. I blink my eyes and jolt myself back to reality. I open the door and slide out of the cars warm leather seated comfort.

I open the door and walk inside the house. I am greeted by silence and it is golden. I walk up the stairs to my room, the air teasing me with its secrets. ‘If these walls could talk,’ I think to myself. If they could talk I would demand answers to my questions. I would open my mouth and scream for pity and understanding. If these walls could talk I would know the secrets that lie within this structure, delighting in my confusion. I remove my suit and lay it over the bed. I slip into some jeans and a shirt. I walk out of my bedroom and head toward the stairs, content to start dinner early. Before I can reach the first step I stop, the air around me holds its breath, waiting.

I turn slightly to the right and I can see that Justin has not closed his door all the way. My brain is yelling stop, don’t stoop to that level, don’t become one of those parents who snoop. I stand still, the beat of my heart vibrating like a drum, the feeling traveling through my body. I move forward a little and push the door open, shuddering as it bangs into the wall behind it, betraying my position. I look around the hallway, knowing there is no one here. When my heart is back in my chest I step into the room.

I see all the clothes and papers scattered around the floor. I know there is no way that Justin did all this. I think back to the kitchen and I know that Craig must have played a part in this mess too. I step over item after item, leading myself deeper into a cave with no obvious place to turn back, to escape. My mind tells me to stop but I can’t… I won’t. I feel the floor under my left foot; it is not flat, it’s not even. I look down and see that I am standing on one of Justin’s sketchbooks; the brave soldier must have survived the battle. 

I bend over and pick it up, wondering how it managed to escape Craig’s wrath. As I move it through the air four separate pictures, Polaroid’s, go fluttering to the ground. I pick them up and come face to face with my unspoken fear. I look at the pictures, all teenage boys, smiling and kissing my son. The voice in my head taps me on the shoulder and says that it doesn’t prove anything, but I know… it changes everything. I hold the pictures in my right hand, the sketchpad in my left, as I look up. My gaze comes to rest on the posters and collages of pictures on his walls. No girls. 

I walk over to one collage and lean in close. There is not a girl in sight except Daphne, I never noticed before or I just plain didn’t care. I can feel my skin flush as realization creeps into my core and paralyzes my diaphragm, stealing my ability to inhale air into my lungs. I close my eyes and sink down onto his bed. My world is spinning and I am struggling for balance. I am so wrapped up in trying to find my own center of calm that I don’t hear the front door close. 

**

I am sitting on a bench in the park watching Gus as he plays with some other kids in the sandbox. I look at the sand and cringe at the thought of it depositing itself on the floor of my shower. I took the day off after spending all night with a fussy toddler. It took hours for me to realize that it was a new tooth that was causing all my problems and then it took me another hour to find the orajel shit. 

I sit my laptop on my lap and start checking my emails, nothing special just the standard stuff. I hear the bus roll to a stop behind me and the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I look up and turn enough to see the same blond from the museum getting off the bus. I swallow and watch as he adjusts his strap and starts to walk slowly into the park. I can feel my soul fall apart and reconstruct itself with every step he takes.

I watch him as he gets closer and closer, never noticing me on the bench. He reaches the bench and it is quite obvious that he is in a world all his own. I watch as he passes me and then stops, dead in his tracks, and turns back toward me. I watch him as he realizes that he has seen me before, the feeling of recognition pounding behind his eyes. I can see him trying to suppress his urge to smile as he walks over to the bench and sits down.

“I saw you in the museum,” he says. Straight and to the point, I like him already. I close my laptop and sit it next to me on the bench. I look over at Gus and then turn my body so I can look at him.

“Yeah, I know,” I say. I can feel my dick stirring and I haven’t even touched him yet. I can smell him, his scent is floating on the heated air and it is wonderful. He smells like water, pure and unpredictable. I have never smelled someone who smells like him, it’s like he is taking his scent and fusing it into my brain and he is not even trying. “So what’s your name?” I ask.

“Justin… Justin Taylor,” he says as he looks directly into my eyes. I can see fire and ice fighting for dominance. “What’s your name?” he asks me. 

“Brian Kinney and that ball of energy over there is Gus, my son,” I say. I can see the disappointment start to crawl onto his face. “I’m gay, don’t worry,” I say as I look at him. He is almost as hard to read as I am. 

“How old are you? You look like you’re sixteen,” I ask. I glance over at Gus to make sure he is still in the sandbox, he is and I groan again.

“What’s wrong?” he asks me. I am the king of avoiding questions, he is dodging. I find it hilarious that he would try and dodge when he is wearing his uniform. He seems to have blissfully forgotten. I smile on the inside.

“I am just thinking how fun it’s going to be to clean him up,” I say as I shake my head and give a small smirk. “Don’t try to dodge the question. How old are you?” I ask him again. Waiting for him to answer takes an eternity. I wait; I wait because I feel a pull from this kid. He is like a magnet. 

“Seventeen,” he answers and I nod my head. “How old are you?” he asks. I watch the amusement play across his face and bleed onto his skin.

“Older than you,” I say with a smirk. He nods his head and accepts this answer… for now anyway. “Why aren’t you in school right now? It’s obvious you either went or had intentions of going,” I say as I grab his tie and let it slip through my fingers. I can feel the sexual heat rising off of him. He is beautiful.

“I needed a break,” he says as he finally breaks the visual lock we have been holding each other in. He looks out across the park at nothing, at everything. We sit in silence for what feels like hours. I watch him as he looks across the park and I wonder if he is worth the effort, he seems to be carrying a lot of baggage. “I am glad I did though because I got to talk to you,” he says and it’s genuine, not forced or a step to something more; Honesty. He looks at me and smiles. 

‘Yeah,’ I think. He is worth it. He is worth a lot, I can feel it. “Why don’t we go get something to eat?” I say. Merge.

* * *

I would really appreciate if you guys let me know if you would like me to put the POV of who is speaking when I switch from person to person. I do it the way I do for a reason but I’ll put the names if you guys want me to. Just let me know.


	5. Rose Water

Monday…

“So tell me, how did you end up with a son?” I ask as I move a fry around in a shallow pool of ketchup, my eyes locked on his. We have been sitting here for over an hour and I feel like it has been ten minutes. Time stops for him. If only I possessed that type of power. 

“These two dykes I know wanted a kid. I came in a cup, and he was born nine months later,” he says, short and sweet. I look over at the little one and smile, he looks just like Brian. “So, are you going to tell me what the fuck happened to your face or am I supposed to guess?” he asks. I stare at him as I put the fry down. I can stop pretending that I am going to eat it. My mind starts to process exactly how much to say, how much to release. I shift in my seat a little and taste the bitter stain of anxiety and embarrassment. I feel my face flush completely before the blood rushes back with a vengeance. 

“That depends on what bruise you’re talking about,” I say as I shift my eyes from his a little. I scratch at the base of my neck with my left arm and immediately regret it when I see his eyes glance at the bandage. I put my arm back down quickly and grab my napkin. I start folding it over and over, like an origami artist who has forgotten the next step. “I got in a little fight at school and then my dad wanted to have a little talk,” I spit out. The sound of my voice is flat and even, like what I am saying has no emotional attachment to me. “Little talk my ass,” I whisper to myself and I know he hears me. 

“Well, that’s fucked up,” he says and for some reason, some stupid reason I feel a little better about it. That he could sum it all up so neatly and efficiently. He doesn’t seem to dwell, everything just is what it is... I like that. “My dad liked to talk too but I finally got tired of listening to what he had to say,” he says. He looks over at Gus and pulls him onto his lap, wiping his hands. We talk for a while longer before he pays for lunch and we leave the diner. He says that we are lucky we did not run into some person named Debbie.

“She’s like my mother,” he says when I ask him about her. He seems to guard himself and I can understand that, he doesn’t know me. When we leave the diner he says that he needs to get Gus back to take a nap. “You want to come?” he asks and my heart is walking two feet in front of me. 

“Sure,” I say. 

**

I see the small smile as it plays across his face. He wants to come to my place, to be with me. I shift Gus a little higher on my shoulder as I talk about Debbie. I can feel the ease in which we talk and it is nice, different, but nice. Nice, god I just said talking to a guy was nice. We walk along the sidewalk and before we can blink we are at the loft. I see him look at the building and down the sidewalk, like he is expecting something.

“Are you expecting someone? Or are you planning to make a run for it?” I ask. He smiles and adjusts his bag.

“The thought did cross my mind,” he says as I open the door and hold it as he follows me into the building. I open the door to the loft and when he walks through I slide the door closed. I see him look around the loft, storing everything in his memory. “Nice place,” he says and I know he means it. I move away from him and go to lay Gus down in his crib.

“Thanks, you can sit down,” I tell him as I go and grab a bottle of water. I get him one too and join him on the sofa.

“Thanks,” he says. We talk some more and I feel like I have known him for ages. We are so wrapped up in what were doing that we don’t notice the time rolling by. Gus is up and playing with his toys and Justin is in the bathroom. He told me all about Shaun and his best friend Daphne and he told me a little about his father. I notice the tears that swell in his eyes, right below the surface, every time he talks about his father. His eyes dance around the topic of Craig Taylor. I hear the water running in the bathroom and after twenty minutes I start to worry.

**

I flip out my phone as I pull into the office parking lot. I turn off the engine and press the speed dial button. The heated air is suffocating me and I roll my window down further to try and get a little more relief. I hear the familiar voice come on the phone and the day just got a little brighter.

“Hello,” she answers and her voice sends shivers down my spine and straight to my cock.

“Hey baby,” I answer. “I’ve been thinking of you. I miss you, why don’t you come down to the office? We can go somewhere,” I say as I feel the blood pumping through my veins. I can already smell her. I switch my phone to my other hand and wait for her to answer.

“Give me thirty minutes baby,” she says before hanging up. 

“Hurry,” I say. I close the phone and wait for her to show up. I call my secretary and tell her to tell anyone who calls that I am busy, and that includes Jennifer; one of the perks of owning the company.

**

I am in the bathroom, in Brian’s loft, demanding that my nerves come back under my control. I stare at myself in the mirror and I cannot believe that I have told this gorgeous man, this stranger, about my problems…some of them anyway. He didn’t move or blink or tell me any bullshit about how everything happens for a reason. I don’t want to hear that shit, no one wants to hear that shit. People want you to listen. People want you to shut the fuck up and listen, even if they have nothing to say.

He listened, even if he wasn’t really listening, at least he put in the effort it takes to pretend. I reach for the soap and I can see my hand shaking. Talking about Craig always does this to me. I talk about him and then I fall apart. I start to rub the soap around in my hands, over and over, the foam becoming thick and constant. 

I place my hands under the water and watch as it starts to engulf my hands. I feel a pull start in the middle of my chest, not quite in my heart and not in my stomach. I blink to take away the feeling but it grows, like a cancer spot on your back that you don’t notice until it’s to late. I close my eyes…evoke.  
 _  
I see the sketchbook that has fallen in front of me and I hold my breath, waiting for his next move. I have no idea what to do, I have never been afraid of him before, until now. “What the fuck is all this shit?” he asks. His voice is low and tight, like pressurized air, waiting for its release. I don’t want to answer; I don’t want to fuel his fire. Thoughts run through my head of what I will do if he tells me to leave, to get out; landscape._

_“What the fuck is this?” he screams again. He stands up and the beer that he has in front of him tips over and spills, spreading across the table like a plague, cascading over the side and over my hands. “I asked you a goddamn question,” he screams at me as he paces the kitchen floor. I have no idea what to say. I am surprised that my art bothers him this much, maybe it’s because he knows. Maybe deep inside he knows and instead of dealing with the real issue he is attacking one that is safe._

_“Sketchpads,” I say softly. I watch as he stops pacing, as he crosses the room and takes my glass in his hand, painting the wall with vitamin C. He picks the muffin up and throws it onto the floor. Motherfucker, I was going to eat that._

_“Do I look fucking stupid to you? I know what the fuck they are, I am talking about the pictures of guys that are on every fucking page Justin,” he says as he grabs the sketchbook off the stove and starts to flip through it, tearing out page after page. This is my moment, truth or dare. Do I have the courage to tell him the truth? Do I risk it all? I think, I think and I make it quick, my brain deciding before my heart has a chance to state its position._

_“They are an assignment from the art club; we are studying the human form. The models just happen to be guys,” I tell him and the taste of the lie in my mouth is bitter and dry._

_“You are going to quit the art club Justin,” he says. Anger, bitterness and shame are all patting each other on the back inside his heart. I can see the relief that washes over him as he gives his command. I see his breathing relax as he fills control wash over him and then I speak._

_“No,” I breathe. I regret it immediately._  
  
“Justin…Justin, are you okay?” I hear Brian say through the door. I look down at my hands as my eyes try focus and the haze tries lift from my brain. 

“I…I’m fine. I’ll be right out,” I say as I wash the soap off of my hands. I breathe deeply, my chest rising and falling quickly. I look at my bag on the bathroom floor next to me. I can feel the pressure inside, the pull. I reach for the bag and when I reach inside it is empty. The room seems to swell, stretching up in front of me. Hyperventilate. 

**

I can hear the water running and the wild breathing coming through the bathroom door. I reach for the handle. “Justin, are you sure that you’re okay?” I ask again. Silence greets me and then I hear the breaking of glass.


	6. Rose Water

Monday / Mid-afternoon…

 

“Justin, are you okay? What happened? Open the door,” I say as I stand outside the bathroom. My heart is racing and I can feel the uncertainty in my soul. I can hear movement inside the bathroom and I take in a breath as I hear the sound move closer. I stand back a little as the door starts to open, giving the questions room to breathe. Heated air spills out of the door when he opens it and I let my captured breath release. 

“I…I umm broke your little cotton ball jar thing,” he says as he rambles on and on. I don’t hear him; my eyes are focused on the thin line of blood that is barely breathing air on the surface of his skin. He looks at me and tears are hugging him but not easing their grip. He moves his arm a fraction of an inch, out of my sight. “I can buy you another one. I just got a little nervous when you called me and knocked it over,” he tells me. I don’t need to know the real reason. 

“Fuck it,” I tell him. I let his eyes follow mine as they travel to his flesh wound. “You sure you’re okay?” I ask again. I pick up Gus when he comes running toward the bathroom. 

“Yeah, I…I think…I think I should go. Yeah…yeah,” he says as he moves past me, pausing just enough for me to know that leaving is the last thing in his heart. “Thanks for lunch,” he says. The way he says it sounds final. Any other time I would welcome that distance and finality, but, not with him. I watch him as he walks down the steps, towards the couch. 

He grabs his uniform jacket and heads to the door. His movements are quick, purposeful. I move toward him as he reaches the door. Gus is holding tightly to my hair and I move fast to release his grip, moving him a little more to my side. 

I slide the loft door open for Justin and when he is almost all the way through it I close my hand down on his shoulder. I feel him quake under my touch. He is like the shifting of the ocean floor, hard to predict… but then again, so am I. I push back all the thoughts I have in my brain and move on feeling, closing my lips onto his. I can feel him. I feel happiness tap dance through my lips and into my soul. Dive deep.

I release him from our world and watch as he gives a small smile. “Later,” I say as I gently guide him out the door. 

**

“Later,” I breathe as the door closes on me. I felt his hand on my shoulder and my whole body loss feeling and gained it back again in less than a second. I run my fingers along my mouth, I can smell the blood on my arm, it smacks me back to the real reason I was in a hurry to leave. I reach the front door of the building and push it open. I don’t know what happened, I know better than to let myself lose control like that. I just went to the emergency room for losing control like that. 

I reach the bus stop and sit at the bench. I see the bus coming down the street and I stand to meet it. I get on the bus and settle into my seat, thinking. I feel a smile creep onto my face when I move around and smell his house on me… him, on me; his lips, on mine.

I watch the scenery fly past the window, blurry and oddly shaped, it’s a lovers vision. The bus lurches to a stop and I get off, turning in the direction of my house. ‘That was a mighty good adventure,’ I think. All except for the last part; I bring my arm up to eye level and inspect it. “Nice one Justin,” I say to myself as my house comes into view. I can see Molly sitting on the porch as I walk up and I notice Craig’s car in the driveway. I glance down at my watch and the time shows that it’s just past four thirty. I wonder how long she has been sitting here.

“Hey Molly,” I say as I reach the porch. “Why are you sitting on the porch? It’s hot as shit out here, why don’t you go in the house?” I ask. I watch her shift uncomfortably and then she answers.

“Mommy told me to come out here and wait,” she says as she looks at me. Her eyes squint as she tries to block out the sun that is behind me. 

“Why’d she tell you that?” I ask. I see tears fall down her cheeks and I sit down next to her. “What happened?”

**  
4:00 p.m.…

“Where are we going Craig?” she asks me again. I have avoided that question since she asked it five minutes ago.

“I figured we’d go somewhere new,” I say as I drive through the stop sign. 

“Where exactly would this new place be?” she asks as she runs her hand behind my head, down my torso and over my swelling dick. I shift in my seat as I push the peddle a little closer to the floor. “My house,” I tell her. I feel her hand move away from me. 

“Your house, are you fucking crazy?” she asks me. “What if your wife is there? Oh my god, what if your kids are there?” she asks. I grab her hand and place it back in my lap.

“My wife is still at work and my kids are not home yet,” I tell her as we get to my street and I pull into my driveway. 

We are all over each other before I can get the door open. I pull her with me into the house and close the front door. I can swear for a moment that I hear movement coming from upstairs. I stop and listen as she kisses up and down my neck. I don’t hear anything else as we move to the living room, clothes dropping in our wake. We fall over the side of the sofa and our assault on each other continues. Our tongues fight each other for access. I arch my back as I sink into her; Cheater.

**  
4:15 p.m.…

I stare down at the sketchbook and photos in my hands and I feel the walls of my world crumble completely. I place the pictures back inside the sketchbook and lay them on the bed next to me. I bring my hands up to my face and wipe the tears away. I didn’t even know I was crying. I pull in my breath and stand up from his bed, stepping over the ruins of my life as I remember it. It will all be different now. 

I make my way to the door and look back into the room. I can see Justin at different ages, different stages of his life… moving through the shadows, not really there at all. I close his door, leaving it slightly open like I found it and I walk toward the stairs. I pause on the fifth step from the bottom, the smells of lust and secrecy billow through the air; Liar.

I walk the rest of the way down the stairs and turn toward the living room. The sight that I see stops my heart, but, strangely I feel nothing but numb. They say that feeling something is better than feeling nothing at all. “Son of a bitch,” I say, and it comes out barely above a whisper. 

“Shit, Shit…Craig…Craig stop…STOP it’s your wife,” I her the red haired woman say to him. I could pull every strand of her hair out of her head. He stills his movements and looks at me. I dare him to move, dare him to speak…dare him to even think to breathe; Caught.

**

“Are you fucking shitting me?” I ask Molly as we sit on the front porch. I am smoking a cigarette and dabbing at the break in my skin. I can see Molly looking at it but she says nothing, she learns fast. “They are in there right now?” I ask. Molly nods her head and wipes the tears off her face.

“I walked in and saw mommy standing at the entrance to the living room and I could see daddy sitting on the sofa and some lady with red hair was on his lap,” she says. “And they were naked,” she finishes. I take another pull from my cigarette and watch as the smoke I exhale folds into the fresh air, choking it.

I feel the last seed of hope I had for this family die. The air is suddenly stale and heavy, every minute seems to last for days. I suck my lip into my mouth, tonguing the split that is starting to heal. I pause when I faintly taste Brian on me. I close my eyes and remember the kiss. When I hear yelling come through the door I whip back into focus. I turn a little, so does Molly, and we stare at the door,

**  
Midnight…

“Whoever the fuck you are, you better have a good reason for buzzing me,” I say into the intercom. I depress the button and wait for the mystery person’s voice to come blaring back at me.

“It’s me, Justin…Justin Taylor,” he says. “I was wondering if you would mind some company?” he asks and I push the button to release the door before he is finished talking. I wait by the door as the lift makes its noisy way down and then back up.

I watch him as he steps off the lift, blue jeans, t-shirt and sneakers…sexy. “Hey,” he squeaks out. “I hope you don’t mind me coming to see you,” he says as he adjusts his bag on his shoulder.

“No, come on in,” I say. God, I am being so fucking nice. I move back and let him pass me breathing him in as he walks by. I watch as he sits on the sofa after glancing at Gus in his crib. I slide the loft door close and move to sit next to him. “So, do you want to tell me what happened?”


	7. Rose Water

Monday 11:00 p.m. …

 

I have been laying here on my bed listening to my parents fight for hours. You could cut the tension that is swelling in the house with a knife. I run my fingers over my fresh scar from earlier and I wonder again how I could have been so careless.

I push up from my bed and walk over to my desk, grabbing a fresh sketchbook from the drawer and moving back to lean up against the bed. I push the things that litter the floor away with hatred, not noticing the sketchbook that has fallen victim to my mother’s snooping hiding in the covers of the now vacant bed, waiting for me to discover its mutiny; Traitor. 

I press the pencil to paper and let my feelings take over, emotions and unexpressed desires assault the page and bring the drawing to life. I pause for a moment and focus on what I am drawing; the image that stares back at me eases my discomfort and causes a smile to tickle my lips. I see Brian clearly, his colorless eyes stare up at me from the swirls of granite, asking me to smile, asking me to be stronger than I think I can be right now. 

I run a finger over the lips of the drawing and wish that they were real, that they were here, that they were warm, alive and loving…that they were mine. I take a breath and ignore the part of me that is growing harder by the mere thought of the handsome and intriguing man. 

Why didn’t I take the kiss and use it as my stepping stone? Why didn’t I claim the prize that was being so easily offered? I know why, because blood was warming my skin and tearing my attention away from the moment. My addiction to pain and control has become my friend, my crutch. 

I jolt my hand to a stop when I hear glass crashing outside my door, so close and so far away. I hear words of anger and hatred, betrayal, lust and desire all mingled together to form one feeling…emptiness.   
_  
“No,” I breathe. I regret it immediately. I have never seen my father move so fast or so swift before. I close my eyes against the attack that I am know is coming. I feel my head jerk to the side and like a rag doll my body follows, afraid of losing its control. I feel my hands grab onto the coolness of the refrigerator and I take in a calming breath of air. I turn my body around and open my eyes to the one person in this world who is supposed to love me without hesitation, without reason._

_I know now that this is not true, he has no obligation to love me and with that revelation also comes the knowledge that I am not required to love him either…but I do, and it hurts. I watch as he brings his hand up and lets the open palm kiss my face, blood spills from my lip this time decorating the front of the refrigerator door in a modern art masterpiece._

_I bring my lip into my mouth on instinct and I feel the blood trace a pattern over my tongue and down into my throat, painting my insides with clarity. Blood is trailing down the side of my face from the first wound and just like the world it feels cold and endless._

_“Don’t you ever fucking say no to me, do you fucking hear me? Do you understand me?” he asks, his hands are squeezing my arms now, pleading with my muscles. I can smell the liquor that is visiting his breath and I nod my head to acknowledge him._

_“Yes,” I squeak out. ‘Yes to what?’ I think. I can’t stop drawing its like air, I need it... I want it. I pray for release and when he lets my arms out of his embrace I press my back against the refrigerator door and grasp at stability. I watch him back away from me and when he moves a little more I allow my eyes to mourn the loses of my sketches, so many hours went into them._

_The slight movement of my eyes is all my father needs to see. He can since the future resistance and rebellion and like a serpent he intends to strike once and to make this session count. He starts to search through the drawers in the kitchen and my brain is scrambling to try and process what he might be looking for. I push away from the cold metal and inch toward the doorway. I step on a spatula that has been thrown to the floor and my heart stops. He turns slightly and I am so scared that I cannot see what he is holding in his hand. When he holds it up and smiles I hear love walk out the door; Insanity._

_I blink away the scene and stare at my reflection in the mirror. I remember where I am, in Brian’s loft, and the anxiety that I feel makes me sick, I need to control it… to feel it. I pull the scalpel from my pocket and drag it across my arm without thinking. The cut is swift and relentless but gentle; Love._

_I hear knocking on the door and I quickly put the scalpel back into its sheath and place it back into my pocket. “I…I’m fine. I’ll be right out,” I say.  
_  
I hear another crash and more glass splinters into the argument. I pull my hand away from the drawing and rub my fingers together, granite staining white. I put the sketchpad down and move over to the door, stepping lightly and quietly. I press my ear to the door and I can hear the angry shouts, they sound like they are right in the room with me, the door does little to mask their audibility. 

**

“I can’t believe that you would bring her here, to _my_ house and fuck her on _my_ sofa,” I say as I throw the crystal he bought me for our resent anniversary. I watch the glass shatter and I see him flinch from the shards as they scatter for cover.

“Jennifer, calm down just let me explain,” he starts. I feel the heat rise to my face as his mind forms the words and they flow over his lips. I pick up the glass vase that was his mother’s most prized possession and hurl it toward him. I smile inside when it hits the wall and shatters. “Jesus Christ,” he yells in surprise.

“You shut the fuck up. You don’t get to explain, I don’t want to hear your bullshit…your lies,” I tell him. I scream it, belt it out at the top of my lungs; Bastard…Release. 

**

I pull my ear away from the door and walk over to my bed, snatching up the small locked box that contains my comfort. I take the box and walk over to the window, slinking down to sit along the wall. I take the key from around my neck and open the box with purpose. I stare at the contents inside the box and slam it close. 

I wrap my arms around myself and gently rock, willing the shouting and the fighting to go away. I can feel the walls of my room closing in on me, suffocating me, pressing me in and away from myself. 

I open the box and stare again. I see the tears fall onto my hand and I quietly wipe them away. I look up at the ceiling like I am expecting something, like the roof is going to tear off and the answers to all my questions will be visible in the open space. 

When I trail my eyes back down I catch a glimpse of my uniform pants, thrown haphazardly across my bed. I move forward and grab the edge of the pants, pulling them closer to me. I reach into the pocket and grab the scalpel. I uncover the sharp edge and watch as the moonlight tickles the metal. I pull my top lip into my mouth and stare at the tip, waiting for something to happen. 

**

“How many times have you fucked her, huh?” I scream. I don’t know if I want to know but I know that I need to know.

“It doesn’t matter,” he tells me.

“Bullshit it doesn’t matter,” I scream.

**

I force my vision to block out the tears and I yank my pants leg up, dragging the blade along the fine skin on my leg. I watch the blood as it trails along my leg before I grab a t-shirt off the floor and wipe it away. I lock the box and place the key back in its place around my neck, letting it drop under my shirt. I push up from the floor and grab the box. 

I walk over to my desk and grab my disregarded bag, tossing the box inside along with my sketchbook and some pencils. I fling the strap over my shoulder and walk over to my window. 

I step out onto the roof and walk along the top for a minute. When I get to the lower portion I slide down on my ass and jump to the ground below. I pause for a moment and wait to see if my movements were heard, they weren’t. I take off down the street, my legs pumping fear and oblivion.

I reach the loft and I didn’t even have a destination in mind. I press the buzzer, thinking of the time after the act is already committed. “Whoever the fuck you are, you better have a good reason for buzzing me,” he says. I swallow a little and for a minute I don’t know what to say.

“It’s me, Justin…Justin Taylor,” I say into the intercom and I immediately feel stupidity creep over me. I could have at least tried to act less nervous and more seductive. “I was wondering if you would mind some company,” I add. Maybe that will cut the nervousness in my voice. Before I finish my sentence he is buzzing me up and I feel a little of the pressure stay at the door. 

“Hey,” I say as I step off the lift. “I hope you don’t mind me coming to see you,” I offer hesitantly as I adjust my bag. He smiles and moves to the side, letting me pass.

“No, come on in,” he says. I can feel him taking me in as I walk pass and I smile a little. I walk over to the sofa, stopping to glance at Gus, and plop myself down right in the middle. I hear the loft door slide close and I know I am trapped in his lair. I feel him slide into the space next to me and I catch my breath. “So, do you want to tell me what happened?” he asks me.

**

I watch him play around with the answer to my question and I bite my tongue to keep from making him rush. I don’t have much patience for bullshit and I have even less patience for it at midnight on Monday after a long day with Gus and the lingering effects of a stiff cock caused by him. I let out a stiff puff of air and take it in again. 

“Stop trying to think of some answer that you think I want to hear and tell me what the fuck you want to say, tell the truth. I don’t want to hear the politically correct answer that your overactive brain is cooking up,” I tell him. I raise my arm and place it in the space behind his head. I run a hand over my hair and wait.

“My father was fucking some bitch on the sofa. My mom was home and my sister walked in on him. They have been fighting about it all night,” he spills. I take a breath and look over at him. 

“Wow, that’s fucked up,” I say. I don’t understand why the fuck people bother getting married when they can stay single and unattached, avoiding all the bullshit. 

“Yeah, it is,” he says. I pull my arm from around him and offer him a drink. “Yeah, thanks,” he says and I get up to get it. I pour two shots of beam and bring the bottle back over to the sofa, placing it on the coffee table. I down my shot and watch as he slings his back. I feel the side of my mouth rise a little and I can tell that I might have met my match.

“I guess you’ve had a couple drinks before,” I say. He smiles at me and licks the liquor that is tainting his lips off. Electricity jolts through my system and I have to remember to breathe.

“Yeah,” he says as he puts his glass down on the table and flings the strap of his bag off of his shoulder. 

“You carry that fucking thing everywhere,” I say as I pour myself another drink. “What the fuck is in it?” I ask. He opens the flap and pulls out a sketchpad and two pencils, turning slightly on the sofa to face me. I feel my cock get a little excited at his shift in position and I urge it to behave itself. 

“My sketchpad and some other stuff,” he answers. He opens the pad and turns to a new page, placing the pencils into the right position in his fingers. “I am going to sketch you,” he says. I love the way he shifts to certainty when he is drawing, it’s almost like two different people. 

“It’s fucking 1 a.m. and you want to paint my fucking picture,” I say. I can’t give into him easily and just _let_ him draw me. I watch the pout push onto his face and I cannot suppress the laugh that comes out.

“No, it’s 1 a.m. and I am going to _draw_ your fucking picture,” he says and I laugh even harder. I have no idea why he makes me laugh but I cannot help myself. “You better stop laughing before you wake Gus up,” he says and I do my best to squash the laughter. 

“Now, just sit there and be natural he says as he presses the pencil in between his lips and studies me and then the blank page. After a couple of minutes he presses the pencil onto the pure surface and I watch his hand move over the page like liquid. I settle into the sofa’s comfort and close my eyes, listening to the swishing of the pencil as it glides over the page.

I open my eyes after a while and I see that he is still drawing, engrossed inside his black and white world. I glance over at the clock and the time reads 2:45 a.m. “Justin, I think I have been sitting here long enough. My ass is falling asleep,” I say. 

“Sorry, I tend to get lost in my work,” he says as he starts to close the sketchpad.

“I noticed,” I tell him with a smirk. “Can I see the picture you were so engaged in?” I say as the front flap is almost all the way down.

“You can see it when I’m done,” he says with a smile that rivals the darkness in the sky. I see the twinkle of happiness and sadness inside his eyes and I wrap my hand around his wrist pulling him closer to me. I am tempted to speak, to say something but I don’t. 

I pull him to me and press my lips onto his, sliding my tongue slowly inside his mouth. I feel his tension evaporate into the air. I trail my hands lower, slipping them over his back and into his jeans. I hear him moan into me and I lose all control.

I pull away from him and I see the tears that are falling from his eyes, I kiss his lips again and pull him to his feet, leading him up to the bedroom and laying him back onto the bed. I remove my clothes slowly and then piece by piece I remove his, passion and heat covering the scars and bruises that hitchhike on his body. 

I lie down on top of him and trail kisses down his chest and back up again. I feel his body shaking beneath me and I stop to see what’s wrong. I look into his eyes and the light that was so bright there seems to dim. I can’t tell if it is lust or pure sadness that is causing the shift in hues. I pull away from him and sit back on my haunches. I smooth a hand along his arm, barely touching his skin. “What’s wrong?” I ask him. I wait for his answer and before it comes more tears drain from his eyes. I pull him into my arms and wait for him to collect himself; Confusion.


	8. Rose Water

I lie down on top of him and trail kisses down his chest and back up again. I feel his body shaking beneath me and I stop to see what’s wrong. I look into his eyes and the light that was so bright there seems to dim. I can’t tell if it is lust or pure sadness that is causing the shift in hues. I pull away from him and sit back on my haunches. I smooth a hand along his arm, barely touching his skin. “What’s wrong?” I ask him. I wait for his answer and before it comes more tears drain from his eyes. I pull him into my arms and wait for him to collect himself; Confusion. 

“What’s wrong Justin?” I ask as he quakes inside my embrace. I tighten my arms around him, pressing tightly to ease away his fears. I feel his trembling quiet to a whisper and I release him from my hold. I watch the embarrassment flood his face and I kiss him softly to let him know that no harm is done.

“I’m sorry Brian. I didn’t mean to fall apart,” he tells me. I bring my hand up to silence him and shake my head. 

“Justin, you don’t have to apologize. You didn’t do anything wrong,” I say as I move to the side of him and sit down. I want to touch him but I want him to know that he has a say in how far things go. I feel his hand trail down my back and I turn to look at him. I see hesitancy and desire building a fire inside of him and I move my body to face him completely. 

“Justin, are you sure you want to do this?” I ask. I have never talked this much to someone that I am about to fuck and I feel my skin take on a chill as I think of all the things that that might mean.

“I want you Brian, I do. I just feel a little vulnerable right now…like a cloud,” he says and I smile at the analogy. I guide him down onto the bed again and position my body on top of his, kissing him fully and devouring his soul while my hand snakes a trail to his pulsating cock. I take it in my hand and bathe the shaft in its own passion.

I feel him twitch and moan slightly under my touch and I know that I have found my clarity. I bring my mouth away from his and lick his swollen lips. I feel his fingers pressing into my back and calling me home. I can feel the fire burning inside of me and I die over and over from the desire to be inside him, to be one with him…to connect with him completely; Surrender.

I reach a hand over to the nightstand and grasp the necessary supplies, laying them on the bed next to his sex soaked body. I kiss and fondle his nipples until they are red and he is arching off the bed, grinding his cock into mine. I push down gently on his body stilling his movements. 

I watch as he watches me, bottom lip tucked into his mouth biting hard to control his lust. “Is this your first time?” I ask him and I watch as he thinks about my question. Bells go off somewhere in the distance of my mind but I silence them when he hesitantly nods his head. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll be gentle,” I say as he trails his hands all over me. I feel his hands come to my face and when his finger softly enters my mouth I suck it in greedily. I put my own finger in his mouth and he eagerly reciprocates the favor, coating my fingers in his warm natural lubrication. 

I pull my fingers from his mouth, the saliva catching on the moonlight that streams through the window. I trail my hand over his being and between his heat kissed mounds; circling his entrance like a caged animal.

“Breathe into me,” I say as I press pass his blockade and make my digits at home in his warmth. I move my fingers gently in and out, speeding and slowing the pace as his body presses me for more.

“Fuck me Brian…please,” he says and it’s all the encouragement I need. I pull my fingers from their position and pull back, handing him the condom.

“Put it on me,” I say as I wait for him to ready me for action. I resist the urge to spring to life in his hand. I release a breath when the condom is on and then I grab his legs and place them on my shoulders, positioning me right where I want to be. I grab the lube and slick it over my cock, making it shine. I place a little more on his waiting hole and wait as he calms a little. “Are you ready?” I ask. 

I watch his head bob up and down and I see his hands reach out and grab the sheets, holding them tightly. I take a quick breath and plunge forward into the unknown sanctity of him. I inch forward little by little allowing him to adjust to the size of me. I watch the colors of ecstasy streak across his face and down his torso as I press my whole self into him. “Mmmm…” I hear him moan and I pull out slightly and come back again. 

The quick movement brings his hands to my back and I feel his fingers as they mark me as captured. I pull out again, and again I plunge forth into unknown territory. I let his legs drop off of my shoulders and I drop myself onto his body, holding on for reality. I angle my hips so that my cock will graze over his prostate, bringing him sensations of unspoken proportions. 

“God…Bri…an,” he pushes out in a rush of carbon dioxide. I feel him arch off the bed in a tidal wave as I graze his prostate again and the movement sends us off of the dangerous edge of the bed and onto the hardwood floor. 

I feel my back slide across the floor on our sweat. In this reverse position he is more alive and beautiful. He is thriving on the control and I love him for it. I see a faint scar along his collarbone as he sits on me unmoving, soaking in the experience. 

I reach a hand up to touch it and when I trace it with my finger I see tears pool into his eyes. He captures my hand and tangles it with his. I place my free hand on his hip and squeeze, urging him to move. He starts to swivel his hips, slow at first and then faster as the feeling intensifies. I pull my hand free and place it on his other hip, guiding him into an up and down rhythm. I keep pressure on his hips as he rides me, long and hard.

I close my hand around his cock and start to pump. I feel him tighten around me and I see the signs of approach in his face. He has his head tilted in joy and his eyes are pools of love. I bring him to the edge of the cliff and we fall over together, both panting and drowning in satisfaction; Unison.

I hold his collapsed body on top of mine and trail my hands along his back. I feel him start to shake again and I can feel the tears as they splash onto my shoulder before coming to rest on the floor. I don’t say anything this time I just let him cling to me… I let him feel it out. 

**  
I am falling apart in Brian’s arms and I cannot bring myself together this time. I am glad that he is not speaking; I don’t want to hear him. I want to push him away, I want to drag a sharp steel blade across my skin and spill my emotions in my own way but I don’t. 

I cling to him instead, tightly, like the world will swallow him. I empty my tears onto him and I can feel my skin burning where it connects with his. After awhile my tears extinguish themselves and we are left to lie in their shadow, gulping the silence.

“I have never felt anything like that before,” I whisper into his ear. I bury my face into his shoulder and smile a little. I have never felt so undeniably alive and endlessly dead. 

“You were amazing sunshine, but, my back is starting to get a little sore. What do you say we move this party to the shower, get cleaned up,” he says and nudges me a little. I push myself off of him and help him to his feet. 

We shower together wrapped in silence, anticipation speaking volumes. We curl up together in his bed and I shiver slightly. He pulls me into him and I hear him fall into dreams. I listen to the soft breathing of Gus as it bounces around the loft and I stare at my bag, slumped against the back of the sofa. I feel like my eyes are x-ray machines and I can see the box and its contents clearly through the walls of the bag, taunting me and teasing me. 

I close my eyes against the powerless bully and snuggle closer to Brian. His arms wrap tighter around me and I feel weightless. I drift off to sleep, the beat of his heart singing softly in my ears.

**

“Mommy, mommy…mommy, I have to go to school and I need lunch money,” I hear Molly say. I open my tear swollen eyes to the morning and cringe against the light. I feel the sheets beneath me and I know that I am still here, that I am still real. I turn my head toward Molly and try to focus on her face.

“What sweetie?” I ask her. I know that she said something but what exactly it was is lost to me.

“I need lunch money for school,” she repeats and waits for me to move. I push myself into a seated position and run a hand over my hair, trying to smooth it out. I glance around the room, wiling my purse into visibility. I stand on my feet when I don’t see it and dozens of tissues abandon my body, trailing behind me as I walk to the door. 

“I think my purse is downstairs,” I say without emotion and I can hear her following behind me, tracing my steps. Her book bag makes a noise every time the zipper hits the side of the bag, it is so low and constant but right now it feels like the only sound in my life.

I glance at Justin’s door as I reach the stairs and I don’t have the energy to deal with him right now. I push him to the side of my mind and concentrate on getting Molly her lunch money.

When I find my purse and give Molly the money she leaves, but not before kissing my cheek and telling me that she loves me. I hug her tightly and let her go only when I hear the bus outside on the street. I hear her laugh with her friends and I pray for the ability to change scenes like that, to flip my emotions like a cheap hooker. I stand at the open door for what seems like hours, waiting for something to happen. 

As I stand there I feel my life run through me, my sacrifices run through me, my hopes, fears, dreams, desires all course through my body and pool at my feet. I walk to the entrance to the living room and come face to face with my sofa. The sofa it took me months to pick out, the sofa that had to be specially ordered because the fabric was rare, the sofa that the daughter I always wanted was conceived on and I feel a sour note rise inside my gut. I don’t want it here, smiling at me and wearing its flag of victory.

I grab the arm of the sofa and start to pull. It easily slides across the wooden floors, scratching the flawless polish along its way. I pull and pull until I can feel nothing and then I pull some more. I bleed my anger into the task and my brain tells me that the sofa is not to blame, but I don’t want it here. I crawl over the arm and move to the other end, pushing the sofa as hard as I can.

I push and push until I reach the front door. Glass and lamps lay broken and bruised on the floor, victims of my rage at the sofa. I move the sofa around, breathing heavily and panting until it is lined with the door and then I shove it forward, toward and through the door with all the strength that I have.

I place my back against the sofa and use my feet to push, shoving the sofa forward. I push in short stabs when the sofa gets stuck and refuses to move. When I realize that it’s not going to budge I move back and slide down to the floor, resting my back along the side of the sofa, breathing deep and letting the tears pour down my face.

I sit for hours thinking and thinking about him and about her and about how long they have been fucking. I pull myself to my feet and walk back up the stairs, ignoring the stares of the few neighbors that have come outside to witness my meltdown. I fold myself into my bed, crawl under the sheets and cry into my pillow.

**

I stretch my muscles and shift under the sheets. I can feel the heaviness of the duvet on my hardened cock and I reach a hand under the sheets to fix the problem. I freeze mid-pump when I hear a happy squeal erupt from Gus. I squeeze my eyes together tightly and then open them to the morning. I push myself up on my elbows and glance at Gus’ crib, expecting to see him standing and waiting for me, like always. When I see that he is not there I feel a panic flush inside me until I catch a movement on the floor in front of the T.V. I see Justin on the floor with Gus, playing with him and feeding him. I flip the covers off and slide into some jeans.

I walk down the steps and head toward the kitchen, fresh coffee on my mind. “I made some coffee. I thought you’d be a coffee before breathing kinda guy,” I hear Justin say and I turn to look at him. He is watching me with shy and bold eyes. I love the balance of nerve and nervousness in him. I watch him as he licks the rest of the banana off his fingers, sucking them into his mouth deeply. I moan a little inside my throat and glare at him when I feel my cock twitch as Gus wraps his arms around my leg.

“Asshole,” I say as I bend down to pick him up. I will my cock into submission and pour myself a cup of coffee. I watch Justin as he moves to the sofa and grabs his sketchpad, losing himself in the pages. I move my coffee cup out of Gus’ reach and shake my head. 

“No,” I say as I take another sip. I finish my coffee and walk with Gus over to the sofa. I sit down and wait for Justin to notice my close vicinity. I am amazed at how normal and comfortable it feels for him to be here. I haven’t known him long enough to drown in him but I can already feel the current pulling me under. 

“I take it that you’re not going to school today,” I say. I watch as the pencil stills on the paper and he thinks about whether or not he will go to school. 

“I really hadn’t thought about it. I doubt it though,” he says as he turns to look at me. “I mean, I know I should but,” he starts and interrupt his words.

“You don’t have to explain shit to me. I’m not a fucking truancy officer,” I tell him as I place Gus on the floor, letting him walk over to his toys on the floor in front of the television. I look over at the clock and roll my eyes at the time. “Shit,” I say as I get up from the sofa and walk into the bedroom. I slide open my closet doors and pull a suit from among the ranks.

“What’s wrong?” I hear Justin say as he approaches me slowly. I lick my lips at the sight of his creamy skin, surrounded by light and glowing. 

“I have to go to work and I am late,” I say as I go into the bathroom and get into the shower. When I get out Justin has Gus all dressed and he is all ready to leave. “Thanks for getting him dressed. You didn’t have to do that,” I say as I pull on my suit and shoes.

“I didn’t mind,” he says as he slings his bag over his shoulder and comes to stand in front of me. I let him wrap his arms around me and I bring my lips down onto his. I can taste him as his trials mingle with mine and when we pull apart I find that my arms are circling him too and holding him close. I break our close embrace and finish tying my tie.

“I better go,” I hear him whisper and I know that he doesn’t want to leave. He wants to stay here forever and I want him to. “Later,” he says as he says his goodbyes to Gus, moving toward the loft door. I follow him to it and wait for my brain to convince my heart to speak to him. 

“Later.” I say when he kisses me again, leaving his sweetness on my lips. I savor the delicious reminder of him. When I close the door the emptiness swirls softly in the atmosphere, burning its presence into the walls and furniture. I look at Gus and move to finish getting ready. When I pass the counter I see a paper. I pick it up and I see all Justin’s numbers, written nicely for me to have. I slip it into my pocket and go to gather Gus’ things. 

**

I am swinging from trees with joy after leaving Brian. I walk to the bus stop and deposit myself on the bench. I feel a mixture of emotions kiss their way up and down my body. I swirl at the dizzy feeling and I smile knowing that I left Brian my numbers. I know he will call, I feel he will call…he better fucking call. 

I see the bus coming and I stand to meet it. When I get on the bus I watch the landscape pass by and when I am close to my house I hop off the bus and drink in the empty street. I am glad that everyone is in school. 

I am four houses from mine when I see Shaun coming down the sidewalk. I curse to myself and wonder for a moment why he is not in school. I slow down my walking and pray that he won’t notice me, knowing the whole time that he can’t help but to see me. 

“Well, well… what do we have here?” he says as he stops in front of me. I try my best to ignore him and when I move to step around him he stops me in my tracks.

“Don’t be a dick Shaun. I am just trying to go home,” I tell him. I see the smile play across his face and I know he is looking at my rumpled clothes and messed up hair. I move to pass him again and I feel his arm lock around mine.

“Where are you going Justin? I seem to remember you and me having some unfinished business,” he says as he runs his free hand over the front of my jeans. I tell my lungs that now is not the time to quit on me and they slowly obey my will. I tug my arm and find that his grasp is unforgiving.

“Shaun, what the fuck are you doing?” I say, trying hard to try and keep the twitches and trembles out of my voice. I see the fires of delight trickle inside of him and I know that he does not buy my façade. I swallow and continue to look him in the eye.

“I just want to talk to you for a minute Justin,” he says as he pulls me close to him. I can feel a familiar cold of a blade against my skin and I flinch slightly. My skin flushes at the loss of control and I feel my gut twist into knots. I feel his fingers grip my arm tight as he leads me through the Boyler’s backyard, toward his house, and into the unknown.


	9. Rose Water

Thanks Carly. You're the coolest.

* * *

Tuesday…

_  
“I want you to suck it,” Shaun says to me. I watch him as he flips his knife open and closed, shifting his weight from foot to foot. Nervousness and excitement seems to pour from him. I shift my eyes and look around his room. I feel small, trapped… caged in and cut off from reality._

_“No fucking way,” I say. I wonder when he graduated to the one who is enjoying the sucking instead of the one who is doing the sucking. I feel his hand on the back of my neck, pushing me down to my knees. I can feel the carpet beneath me and I cannot stop my fingers from running across the surface. It is soft and plush; such a deep contrast to the person who inhabits the room._

_“I said suck it… you fucking faggot,” I hear him say. His voice breaks through my thoughts and I realize that he is already out, ready and hard. He dangles his cock in front of my face and I stare at it, contemplating what to do. All my decisions are made for me as I feel his left hand grab my hair pushing me closer as his right hand trails the knife along the side of my face. I move my hand from the carpet to my chin, wiping off the drops of pre cum that have landed there. I feel his grip on my hair tighten and before I can move, before I can think, before I can put my mind anyway else but here I feel him enter my mouth._

_The smell of him assaults my senses and makes me gag, which only causes him to slide further into my mouth, into my throat… into me. I feel him pull back and groan as he pumps into me. I don’t think; I can’t. I feel him sliding back and forth across my tongue and I can’t allow myself to feel; I’m not here. Discarnate._

_“FUCK,” I hear Shaun shout. I feel more of his fluids draining into me and suddenly I am aware of everything. It all comes back to me. The walk here, the house, the stairs, the room, the carpet, the smells… Brian. I feel Shaun pull back and I react, clamping down hard, fast, and with no remorse, mercy, or restraint. Empowerment.  
_  
I run up the back stairs to my room, slamming the door behind me. My legs feel like rubber and my heart is beating faster than I ever thought it could. I drop my bag to the floor quickly, almost tripping over it as I make my way into the bathroom. I turn the faucet on. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and I pause. I can see the blood still running from my mouth, over my chin and onto my shirt. The dark red color makes the white of my shirt stand out and almost glow. 

I rip the shirt off my body and throw it to the floor. I run my hands under the water and I see the blood that is staining them. I scrub at it, willing it to come off… go down the drain and disappear. I take handfuls of water and place them in my mouth, rinsing the coppery taste from my tongue. I watch the water in the sink take on a red tinge as the blood folds into it.   
_  
“Son of a bitch, you fucking faggot. I am gonna kill you. You ‘re dead… you’re fucking dead,” I hear Shaun scream as I run from the room and out of the house. I barely feel my feet hit the grass as I move through backyards and over and through fences. I get to my own backyard and the door seems miles away.  
_  
I grab my toothbrush and scrub the inside of my mouth, hard. The bristles run across my teeth and tongue and the water from them slides down my throat. I wonder for a moment if it’s enough to drown me.

**

“Thanks for watching him Brian,” Lindsay tells me as I finish changing out of my suit. I sit next to her and watch as Gus clings to his mom. Like the couple of days he spent with me were so bad. “Was he a lot of trouble?” 

“No, and even if he was do I really need to report it?” I say as I look at her. I see her smile when I ask her that and she nods her head as if to say I know he is your son so I don’t need to ask. Behind her eyes, somewhere hidden behind the smile and easy going manner I see sadness. I know she misses Mel but she refuses to act like she does. I can almost hear the wheels turning in her head, working up the courage to ask the question that wants so badly to touch her lips and taste the air. 

“Did you have to call Melanie?” She finally asks me. I watch as she bounces Gus on her lap. She wants me to say yes. She wants me to have had some contact with the brunette, but I haven’t. I look over at her and give a small smile, my tongue stuck firmly in my cheek.

“No, I didn’t call her,” I say; short and to the point. “If you want to talk to her so fucking bad why don’t you call her?” I ask her. 

“I fucked up Brian,” she says softly.

“Oh come on, so fucking what. You fucked some guy, satisfied your itch and its over. I seem to remember Mel having her needs met too,” I tell her. I watch as she absorbs the information and leans back into the sofa. 

“Yeah,” I hear her say. It’s almost a whisper. The minutes tick by as we sit together in comfortable silence. I feel the warmth of the sun press into me through the window and I smile as I think of the one person that warms me; Sunshine. I help Lindsay take Gus’ stuff to the car and watch as they drive down the street. For a few seconds I almost think that Justin isn’t there, that he isn’t real; Apparition.

I see him sitting on a bench close to the bus stop all alone. I look across the street to see what he is staring at and nothing is there. I walk over to him and stand next to the bench. I can see his chest moving and it’s the only thing that tells me he is not dead. “Hey,” I say as I sit next to him. He doesn’t move, doesn’t speak. I wave my hand in front of his face and he almost jumps out of his skin. “Were you expecting to run into someone?” I ask him with a raise of my eyebrow. He scrunches his face and gives me a puzzled look. “You’re not wearing a shirt,” I say as I gesture to his chest.

“Yeah,” he says softly as he looks down at his chest. I grab his hand and pull him to his feet. I lead him back to the loft and into my life.

**

“Brian, you really don’t have to do this,” I say as he moves into his bedroom. I watch him dig in his drawer and get a t-shirt out. 

“Justin, just put the fucking shirt on,” he says as he tosses it to me. I catch it and slide my jacket from my body. I don’t even remember putting it on. I pull the t-shirt over my head and pull it down. My skin welcomes the cotton. It is a little big for me but it is perfect. “Why in the fuck are you running around with no shirt on?” 

“No reason. What are you working on?” I say quickly as I look at all his papers that are spread out on the table. I sit down on the couch in the same spot as before. 

“I work in advertising and those are some mockups for a new campaign I‘m working on,” he tells me as he sinks into the couch next to me. I feel his heat and I relax. I pick up one of the papers and look at it. I know that Brian wants to ask me questions, he wants to dig and he wants to know… he needs to know… but he stays silent. Contemplation.

“You should move the name of the product to the other side; it’ll balance out the weight of the poster. It won’t make everything look like its being pushed on you. Do you know what I mean?” I ask as I look at him. He takes the paper from me and looks it over. I see him smile a little and nod at my suggestion. “I expect to be paid for that piece of advice,” I say. 

I know he knows that I’m joking and I am glad that an explanation is not needed. I use my hand to scratch my nose and I know that the move makes me look even younger than I already do. I can’t help it, he makes me nervous. His intensity… makes me nervous. His willingness… makes me nervous. His unspoken passion… makes me nervous. I like it. “So, what do you do for fun? Or do you spend all your time in this loft?” I ask him.

**

I put the piece of paper down on the table and turn my body toward him. “So, you want to know what we do for fun,” I say to him as I move my body closer. I can feel him tense and I lean in a little more. “Do you really want to know what we do for fun?” I ask. I can see the gleam of excitement flashing inside him. He nods his head.

“Yeah, I really want to know,” he says. He is a mixture of fire and ice. I never know what I am going to get with him. I can hear the utter excitement and hesitation mix together inside of him. I laugh a little when he gives a final nod. He looks into my eyes and for a minute I can’t breathe. He makes me nervous. His openness… makes me nervous. His desire… makes me nervous. His pain… makes me nervous. His secrets… make me nervous. His need to forget, to hide, to feel nothing… is just like me. I fear it. 

I look down at my clothes and grab his hand. “Then let’s go,” I say.

**

“Holy shit; do you come here all the time?” He asks me. 

“Practically every night, sunshine,” I say as I we move up the stairs. I give Kyle the doorman a small nod and he moves out the way and allows Justin to enter. “Thanks Kyle.”

“Anything for you Brian,” he says. I see Justin’s eyes grow as we enter the sea of bodies. The lights bounce off of his pale skin and he looks… beautiful. I pull him behind me toward the bar. I can see Emmett standing there, scanning the crowd.

“I was wondering when you’d show up,” Emmett says. He takes a drink from his glass and notices Justin. “Who is this tasty thing?” he asks. 

“Emmett, this is Justin. Justin, this is Emmett,” I say. Justin smiles at him and soon they are engaged in a conversation. I listen only vaguely to the two of them. I order two beers and hand one to Justin. I watch him drink it down. He finishes it fast and sits it down on the counter. We stand here for awhile with Emmett holding up the bar and letting the music wash away all our worries. “Where are all the guys?” I ask.

“Michael and Ben went to some relaxation thing,” Emmett says with a roll of his eyes. “And Ted went to the bathroom,” he informs me. I nod my head and grab Justin’s hand, leading him to the dance floor. I pull his body into mine and we move together. Liquid. 

I let my lips brush lightly across the skin of his forehead. The smell of him is rich, almost sweet. Sex. He dances with no restriction. He feeds off of the music. We melt into each other and then there is only us. We are suspended above it all. We are surviving inside it all. We are fighting our demons. Mine are old and festering. His are alive, fresh, thriving and growing. 

**

I pull him into the loft and close the door. I am supporting his full weight as I try to punch in the security code. I toss my keys on the counter and drag Justin over to the sofa. I drop him down and collapse next to him. I pull his jacket from under me and toss it onto the other chair. I look over at the drunk blond next to me and I can’t stop my fingers from tracing over the outline of his hair. A moan comes from him and he shifts slightly. I don’t even feel myself drifting.

**

I can feel his full weight on my right side. I have to pee and he has me pinned to the couch. I contemplate not moving but my bladder protest all thoughts of that idea. I roll from under him and land on the floor on my hands and knees. I focus on my surroundings and make my way to his bathroom. I glance at his clock as I come out the bathroom and the time reads 4:43 a.m. I rub my eyes and make sure that’s the real time. “Fuck.” I walk back over to the couch and right before sitting down I stop. Brian is in my spot. I push him over and squeeze back in where I was. 

I close my eyes and try to go back to sleep but I can’t. I can still feel the buzz of the alcohol running through my system, numbing me. I feel Brian move beside me and when I feel his hand brush over my cock I stir and open my eyes. “I thought you were sleep,” he says. I give him a small smile and I know it is the smile of a still semi-drunk person.

“Mmm, no I’m not sleep,” I say softly. I feel his body shift onto of me and I move so that I am flat on my back with him covering me. I breathe deep when he presses his lips onto mine. I bring my hands around him and hold onto his back, gently pulling him closer. I open my mouth slightly and let his tongue into me. I open my legs and I feel his cock make contact with mine. We kiss each other with vigor. I moan and arch into him as my cock strains against my jeans, wanting more. 

**

I pull away from him and sit back on his legs. I pull my shirt off my body and moan lightly as he traces a hand down my chest. I watch him as he unbuttons my jeans and I unbutton his. I stop his hands and pull his shirt off of him. I watch him as he lies back on the couch. He is almost too much. I get up and pull my jeans off as he slips out of his jeans and underwear. I sit back on the sofa and pull him onto me. I feel his heat bond with mine and there is no end to our desire for each other. I grip the back of his neck and pull him into me. Our tongues battle each other, each one wanting a taste. 

**

I feel his heat and everything else melts away. I can taste him and he tastes like… everything. I feel his hand placing pressure on the back of my neck and then I feel his other hand grip my hair. I moan into his touch. I feel him shifting, moving and guiding me down his body.   
__  
“I want you to suck it,” he says to me.  
  
“Stop, stop… Stop,” I say. I move to get off of him. I can feel everything in my stomach trying to get out and I race to the bathroom.


	10. Rose Water

AN: Thank you to my beta Carly who stopped working on her story to beta mine. THANK YOU CARLY.

* * *

I lean over the toilet and am grateful that nothing comes out. I go over to the sink and drink a couple of handfuls of water. I take a deep breath and wonder when everything got so fucked up. “God, we are so pathetic. I wonder why he even lets us come around,” I hear myself say. I shift my eyes to the right and I see myself in the mirror. I am standing here, watching myself watch me and I wonder if I have crossed the line from troubled to insanity. 

I am having that moment. That crucial moment when you _snap_ and suddenly you are standing outside of yourself. I wonder when I started to swallow everything; every feeling, every emotion… any and every sense of myself. I try to think of the moment in time, of the exact moment but I can’t remember one. “The moment doesn’t matter,” I say to myself. “What matters is that you are no longer you. You don’t exist. You are a haze of the person you want to be and a shadow of the person you were… and you can’t go back,” I finish. 

“I can’t go back,” I echo into the air around me and I realize that I can’t change everything, but, I can take a step forward. One small step and I can leave part of myself behind, but, do I want to? Do I want to step away from everything?

I feel a tap on my shoulder and I shift my eyes to the other side of the mirror. Shaun is standing there, blood soaking his jeans and he is pissed. I feel the terror race through me and then all of a sudden I break. I can feel it rise from deep inside and I start to laugh. I laugh until I can’t breathe. I can taste the tears as they roll into my mouth and when I look down and realize that I am not wearing any clothes I laugh harder. 

**

I walk over to the bathroom door and I listen as his tear soaked laughter floats through the blockade. I know the door is not really an obstacle. I know it is unlocked and that I can slide it open and invade his privacy but I don’t. I drum my fingers nervously against the frame and wonder what my next move should be. I don’t have to think too long. I see the door slide open and he is standing before me. I feel a shift in him. “Justin, are you…” I start to say but he reaches up and presses my lips to his.

“Don’t say anything,” he says to me as he kisses me again. I want to ask him so many things but I don’t. I can see the redness and the remnants of tears around his eyes and still I say nothing. I lace my fingers with his and as I kiss him I guide him toward the bed. I ease him down onto the mattress and trail kisses from his mouth to his chest, his nipples, his stomach, his belly button, his thighs, ignoring his hardening cock.

I can feel his body move under mine, shifting, urging me on. I take the leaking member into my mouth and his body leaves the bed, arching up violently before settling back into the rhythm. He is running his fingers through my hair. Pulling and twisting and memorizing it all. I feel his hand on my shoulder and I release him. I place another kiss on his lips and suck on the sensitive flesh of his neck as he guides me over onto my back. I feel him straddle me and when the warmth of his mouth engulfs my cock I can feel all of him. 

I can feel his hesitation, his fear, his pain, his need, his want… his everything. I stop him before I fall over the edge and when he sits up, his ass resting over my cock, I take in a deep breath. The light from outside hits him and I can see him for the first time… all of him. I move a hand away from his thigh. I trace my fingers along the small scars I see on his stomach, his arms and his legs. I watch the tears seep into his eyes and I know. I know his secret and he knows that I know. Relief. Release. 

I reach over and take a condom from the nightstand. I hand it to him and watch as he rolls it onto my dick. The heat of his fingers and the silence between us makes every sense feel like its on fire, burning and ready to combust. I watch him as he reaches for the lube before I can give it to him. He readies himself quickly and lifts himself up. I hold my dick in place as he impales himself, allowing no time for adjusting. I feel the tightness of him and the heat and I know he is real. I hold onto his thighs as he rides me. He moves his hips in ways that until this moment were unknown to me. 

I reach a hand up to his face and pull him down close to me. I crash my lips onto his and snake my tongue into his mouth, tasting him, tasting me. I kiss down his neck as I arch into him. We are silent, the buzz of the refrigerator and the tick of the clock is all that keeps us from floating away. I can feel the moisture coming from him as he cries. It hits the side of my face as I kiss along his jaw. I can feel him tightening around me as he moves with more determination. I meet him every step of the way, telling him without speaking that he doesn’t have to worry about me walking away… I am a constant. 

A strangled cry and moan are all that come from him as he erupts, spraying his seed onto both of us. I thrust upwards a few more times before slipping into euphoria. I wrap my arms around him and hold onto him. I can feel him shaking almost violently as his body wants for more. His hips start to move again, searching for something. He is holding onto me, his arms and hands gripping me so tightly that I know I will be bruised but I let him hold on. He is pushing himself down onto me again and my body is starting to respond. 

I tighten my hold on him and stop his movements. “Pain management,” I say as I hold onto him. I watch his blond hair move slightly as I speak into his ear. He lifts up and I feel myself leave from inside the comforts of him. I remove the condom, tie it off, and place it on the edge of the bed. He sits up high on my thighs, pressing himself into me. I hold him tightly as he cries. The tears are hot and they burn as they seep through my skin and into me. He is shaking in my arms and all I can do is hold on. 

**

I hold onto Brian and let go of everything. I know he knows my secrets. He is not stupid and I am surprised it took him this long. “I can’t breathe,” I say into his neck as the sobs come out of me and the tears spill down my face. I can feel my body shaking.

“Yes you can,” he says to me. For what seems like forever we sit there, the fog of alcohol long ago lifted. I can feel myself slipping under the blankets of my mind and then… I see nothing.

**

I feel his grip loosen on me and I hear his breathing even out and I know that he is asleep, passed out and exhausted from everything. I smooth my hand over his hair and lean back. I trace my fingers along the scars on his body and I wonder why. I wonder why he does it but deep down I know. He needs to do it; he needs to feel it, needs to feel… something, anything and everything. I do the same thing. I drink, fuck, forget and smother the pain away. We are each other’s copy.

**

“Wow Brian, are you sure that someone else isn’t doing it to him?” Lindsay asks me as she goes back into the kitchen to get a cookie for Gus. I watch him as he stands between my legs and I smile.

“He said that he did it to himself. I asked him about the busted lip but he wouldn’t say anything about that and when I asked him about what happened when he was sitting on the bench when you picked Gus up he changed the subject, so I am pretty sure that he has a lot more shit running through his head then just the cutting,” I tell her. She comes back into the room, gives Gus the cookie and sits on the sofa. I watch her thinking from my spot in the chair in the corner and I wait for her to say something. 

“What are you going to do?” she asks me. I have been asking myself the same thing. 

“I have no idea. I have talked to him about it and he says that he is not going to do it anymore but I have never been stupid and I know that he is probably going to do it again,” I say. I sit Gus down on the floor and lean back in the chair, my eyes trained on my son. 

“Well, you can’t just not say anything; maybe you should go over to his house and talk to his mother,” Lindsay says. 

“I thought about calling her but he said that he would tell her,” I say.

“And has he told her yet?” Lindsay asks. I cross my arms over my chest and look at her.

“No,” I say. Lindsay lets out a breath of air and tucks her legs under her body.

“And it’s been how long?” She asks me. I take my eyes off of her and look over at the clock on the wall.

“Four weeks,” I say as I reach into my pocket and pull out a piece of gum. I pop a piece in my mouth and offer some to Lindsay. She says no thank you and pushes the hair out of her face.

“That’s a fucking month Brian. Maybe you should talk to him again and see if he’s told her,” she says to me and I know that she is right. I should talk to him and his mother should know but he has been better in the last couple of weeks and I don’t want to shake him too much.

“I know,” I say. “I know I need to talk to him.”

**

“I know I need to talk to her,” I tell Daphne as we walk along the edge of the field. The rest of the gym class is running or jogging and has passed us more than once. 

“Taylor and Chanders, lets move it out there. We are not staying on the field all day,” the gym teacher yells to us. We both stop to look at him as he rants and then continue walking at the same pace. 

“Justin, she needs to know. How are you going to get help if you don’t tell her?” Daphne asks me. I look up at the sun and I feel the cool air as it nips at my arms through the material of my shirt and I am glad that I slipped sweats under my shorts. I tug at my sleeves until they are covering my hands.

“Help for what?” I ask. I see Daphne stop out of the corner of my eye and I stop walking too. I look at the puzzled look on her face. “I don’t need any help Daphne. I stopped doing it. It’s not an issue anymore,” I tell her. 

“Justin, I really don’t think that it’s something you can just stop doing,” she says as we start walking again. “I looked up some information on the internet and I really think…” she starts to say. I cut her off before she can finish.

“I really think that you should mind your own fucking business,” I tell her as we continue to walk. Daphne crosses her arms over her chest and walks faster.

**

“Pay attention Peters, I am not going to repeat myself fifteen different times,” Coach Johnson says as we sit on the bench inside the dugout. I look back at him but my brain won’t let go of the blond that is walking around the field just behind his shoulder.   
_  
“Why in the fuck are you walking like that?” Brad asks me as I come out of my house. I tighten my grip on my book bag and close the door behind me._

_“None of your fucking business,” I say as I move to walk past him and get into his car._

_“Dude, don’t be such an asshole,” Brad says as he gets into the driver’s seat. I look over at him and shut my door.  
_  
I look over at the metal bat that fell over and ripped me from my memory. I watch the blond and his best friend and I smirk when I see Daphne cross her arms and start to walk faster, leaving him in her shadow. I have always liked Daphne, maybe I should get to know her a little more. I watch Justin as he grabs onto her shoulder and stops her from walking. 

“Make sure you bring your gloves and your own bats if you have a special one that you like to use,” I hear the coach say. I silently curse him for getting in my way. He shifts on his feet and moves a little to the left. Justin and Daphne come back into view and I train my eyes on them again.

**

I grab Daphne’s shoulder and stop her from walking. “Look, I’m sorry, ok?” I say. She nods her head a little at me. “I didn’t mean it to come out like that Daph; it’s just that it’s hard enough to know that I have to tell her. I don’t need everyone breathing down my neck telling me what they think I should do or how they think I should do it,” I say. 

“I know,” is all she says before walking away from me. I want to make her feel better but I don’t have the energy. I watch her for a few more minutes and then I turn in the opposite direction and walk back across the field and into the building.

**

The coach finishes talking and I watch as Daphne and Justin walk away from each other. “You’re my best player Shaun. I hope that you pay more attention at the game than you did at practice today,” he says to me.  
 __  
“You’re my best player, I need you to play today,” he says to me. I take the note back from him and put it in my pocket.

_“I know coach and I am really sorry,” I tell him and I mean it. I can hardly walk. Playing baseball is not even an option. “The doctor said I should be okay in about a week or so,” I say._

_“Well, I guess that’s good news,” he says to me as he marks my name as benched on the player’s roster and ushers me to sit down.  
_  
“Sorry Coach Johnson,” I say as I watch the blond head disappear into the building. 

“Sorry doesn’t win games Shaun,” he tells me. I watch him shake his head in frustration before walking away from me to talk to the pitcher. I watch the mocha skinned girl make her way from the field and over to the water fountain on the side of the building. I watch her as she sits in the grass while the rest of the class plays some sort of game.

“How come you aren’t playing?” I ask as I sit down in the grass next to her. I can feel the anger and bitterness rising from her as I lean back on my arms. 

“What the fuck do you want?” She spits at me. 

“Damn, rude aren’t you,” I say. “I just wanted to come over and say hi,” I tell her. She scoffs and pulls at the blades of grass around her. 

“I highly doubt that you came all the way over here to say hi and ask me why I am not playing… whatever it is that they are playing,” she says as she pulls the individual pieces of grass apart and lets them blow in the soft breeze. It’s going to be cold soon.

“You’re wrong, I did come over here to ask you that, and, to say hi,” I tell her. I can tell what she is thinking. She wears her feelings on her face. “Just because your best friend and I can’t fucking stand each other doesn’t mean that we have to be complete assholes to each other,” I tell her. She looks at me and her eyes seem to travel up and down my body. I wonder if I am breaking her down.

**

“That’s fucking bullshit,” I scream as I sit across from Jennifer. My lawyer grabs my arm to tell me to stay calm.

“I don’t see why it’s bullshit. I stopped working for over fifteen years to help you start up your business. I took care of your kids and your house and managed all of your business affairs. I don’t think its bullshit to ask for half of everything,” Jennifer tells me. “And spousal and child support,” she adds. I turn to my lawyer for some sort of help.

“Mrs. Taylor, your oldest son turned eighteen two and a half weeks ago,” my lawyer tells her. I sit back in the chair and grin at her.

“I am very aware of that fact and I am also aware that I have a ten year old daughter. Surely he doesn’t expect for me to take care of her all by myself,” she says to my lawyer before turning her eyes to me and smiling. I almost hear it inside me. It is barely a whisper. The voice inside that regulates stupidity and reasoning. I almost hear it and I almost listen.

“Fuck you, I am not paying you for some bitch that I never wanted to have and I sure as hell am not going to pay you half of my fucking money so that you can use it to feed and clothe that fucking faggot son of mine,” I scream at her. I am on my feet now, looking down at her. I want her to be scared, I want her to flinch with the strength of my tone but she says nothing. 

“Fine, if that’s the way you feel we can go to court and we can drag it out. It really doesn’t matter to me but you are going to pay,” she says. I watch her as she stands. We are looking at each other face to face across the expansive oak table. “You always get to do whatever you want but not this time. This time I get things my way. You fucked around on me. You went against all your promises and I am not going to stand in the ashes of your mess and just smile and dust myself off while you get to enjoy yourself, fuck that,” she says as she grabs her purse and leaves the room.

I watch her as she stops just outside the door. “And don’t forget, I know things, a lot more things than you know I know. Many things… detailed things,” she says before she shuts the door behind her. I feel my face flush and I sit down in my chair, defeated and shrunken. 

“I’ll call my accountant. I want a check cleared out to her and the order for the spousal and child support drawn up as quickly as possible. I want to know how much I have to pay before the end of next week,” I tell my lawyer.  
 __  
“How cheap can you get the supplies for the MacMillian job?” I ask the contractor as I look over the drafts for the new downtown office complex.

_“Real cheap boss,” he tells me. I look over at him and smile. “Jimmy even said he was willing to drop the price since we use him every time,” he tells me._

_“That’s a good thing. Tell him to try and get the stuff here in the next three days, I want to start as soon as possible,” I say._

_“I’ll see what I can do. It’s not so easy ordering _borrowed_ supplies,” he says with a laugh as he leaves the office. I see Jennifer standing right outside the door, obviously about to come in and I cringe. She steps into the door and closes it behind her. _

_“Care to explain what that was about?” She asks me.  
_  
I get up and walk out of Jennifer’s lawyer’s office. The two hired guns can work out the details amongst themselves.

**  
I knock on the loft door and smile when Brian slides it open. “Hey,” I say as I hook my arms around his neck and pull him into me for a kiss.

“Mmm, hey,” he says as we break the kiss. I feel his hands running down my back and I smile into his neck. “I thought you were coming over later,” he tells me. I move away from him and toss my bag onto the floor.

“I missed you,” I say as I walk into the kitchen and grab an apple off the counter. I walk over and flop down on the futon cushion that is on the floor in front of the television.

“I bet you did,” he says as he comes and sits next to me. “We need to talk,” he says and I can feel my heart skip three beats and then stop completely.

“Talk about what?” I ask. I bite into the apple and chew very slowly.

“Did you tell your mother Justin?” He asks me. I swallow and turn to him sweetly.

“Tell her what? That I am gay or that I have a boyfriend,” I say as I run a hand over his face. I love to watch him cringe at the word boyfriend and I use it as much as I can. He grabs my hand gently and pulls the sleeve of my shirt up.

“You know what I am talking about,” he says as he lets his thumb trace over a not so old scar. I pull my arm away before he has time to register that the scar is not healed over completely. That it is new, and permanent.

“Not yet, soon, ok?” I say. He looks over at me and smiles a little. He gets to his feet and walks over to the bedroom. I watch him as he grabs a shirt to go on top of his tee and slides his shoes on. “Where are you going?”

“ _We_ are going talk to your mother.”


	11. Rose Water

I throw my controller on the floor and lay down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Brad takes the abandoned controller and leans against the bed next to Jeffrey. I listen to the noises of the video game as I reach into my pocket and pull out a cigarette. I light it up and take a deep pull into my lungs. “Did you fucking see the way Tiffany had her skirt on? It was up all extra high and shit. I could almost see her fucking pussy,” Jeffrey says as he manipulates his player. 

“It’s always up high. That girl is a fucking tramp, everyone has had her,” Brad says. I scratch the inside of my arm. It’s true, everyone has had Tiffany. Hell, I’ve had her more than a couple times. I take another pull on my cigarette and blow the smoke out.

“Fuck Shaun, do you have to smoke that shit in here? There isn’t any airflow in here,” Jeffrey says to me. I wonder sometimes why we let him hang around with us. He is a bit of a badass but I think it’s more for me and Brad’s benefit. I think deep down he is a nice guy.

“It’s my fucking room asshole,” I say. He grunts a little and slouches down a little further on the floor. He is almost flat on his back with his head propped up against the bed. He cannot be comfortable. “Did you see Taylor when we were at practice today? He is such a fag,” I say.

“Now Heather Jenson, that’s a first class piece of tail. She is a virgin and everyone wants to be her first time,” Jeffrey says.

“He thinks he is so much better than everyone else,” I say to them. I don’t think they are listening to me. Brad looks over at Jeffrey and smiles.

“Yeah, she is fine, but you know who I wanna fuck? I wanna fuck Daphne, she is fine,” Brad says with a wicked smile on his face.

“I talked to her today,” I say. They both stop talking to look over at me.

“Yeah right, about what?” Brad asks me.  
 _  
I see her eyes travel up and down my body before they rest back on my face. “What in the hell makes you think that I have anything significant to say to you?” she asks me. I wince a little. I thought we were getting somewhere. “All you have ever done is be mean to my best friend,” she tells me. I sit up and move a little closer to her at the same time._

_“I know, but I like you. I think you are very pretty and I was wondering it you would want to go out to the movies and maybe dinner with me,” I say to her. I watch as a grateful smile falls over her face. I smile brightly, matching hers. She leans her face close into mine, smoothes her hand across my face and says, “Fuck… you.” I watch as she gets up and goes into the building.  
_  
“The standard shit. I told her I thought she was hot and asked her if she wanted to go to the movies with me on Friday,” I tell them. 

“Yeah, and what’d she say?” Jeffrey asks me. I raise an eyebrow at him. 

“She fucking said she’s think about it. I mean come on, she is not a desperate whore who needs to jump at any invitation she gets,” I say. I snuff out the cigarette and sit up on the bed. I move the hair out of my face as I put the ashtray on my desktop. “I told her that just because Taylor and I don’t get along doesn’t mean that the two of us can’t be friends,” I say.

“Yeah and I can just guess what she had to say to that,” Brad says as he turns his attention back to the video game. “You are so full of shit. You say that you don’t like him but you talk about him every ten fucking seconds. Give us a goddamn break,” he finishes. Jeffrey just laughs. I get up from the bed and walk over to my door and pull it open.

“Get the fuck out. Go home and bother your own families,” I say as they start to laugh. They think that they are pissing me off and they are right. I slam the door when they are both on the other side and listen for the familiar slam of the front door.

**

“I’m not going,” I say softly. Loud enough for him to hear me and quiet enough for him to know that I am not certain.

“Justin, you said you were going to tell her,” he says to me as he stands next to the door with his keys gripped loosely in his hand. I sit up with my legs crossed into a pretzel shape. I rest my hands in the small hidden space between them, rolling the apple over and over, gripped by only my fingers. I bite the inside of my lip and demand that my tears stay away.

“I know what I said,” I say as my eyes meet his. “I said that I was going to tell her and I will. I really don’t want to talk about this right now,” I say as I get up and cross over the floor to stand in front of him. I rise up and kiss him on the lips, the apple held tightly in my grasp. I use my free hand to pull him closer. I feel his hand on my wrist and the other one on my chest, pushing me away.

“Either you tell her now… or, I will,” he says and I know that he means it.

**

I can feel his heart beating as I grip his wrist. I can feel it racing with the effort to hold it all together. I hold onto him and wait as he processes what I have just said. “Brian, I said I would tell her,” he says as he gently tries to yank his arm away from me. 

“You keep saying that but you aren’t fucking doing it,” I yell. I watch him as he flinches with the force of my words and I know that I am heard in the other lofts. “Do you think I am fucking stupid Justin?”

**

My name, he used my name. Not sunshine. Not sonny boy. Not twink. Not twat, just… Justin.

“I’m not stupid. I see you carrying that fucking box into the bathroom after we fuck. Every fucking time,” he says to me. His tone is steady and strong but I can hear the vulnerability just beneath the surface. Just out of reach. Concrete. 

I struggle to free my arm from his grasp but he holds on tightly. He kicks my book bag slightly as the strength of my pulling causes him to step forward. He looks down and my eyes follow his. “It’s in there now, isn’t it?” 

He picks the bag up, holding onto my wrist as he walks over to the kitchen and dumps the contents onto the counter. All my sketchpads, pencils, sharpeners and erasers scatter onto the counter while some seek refuge by falling to the floor. The box hits the marble countertop and the sound echoes through the surroundings. “Open it,” he says. I can hardly see him through the anger and tears in my eyes.

“No,” I say. He stares at me and then drops my arm. He picks up the box and I move behind him, clawing at the box from around his back. “What are you doing?” I say as he keeps the box out of my grasp. “Brian, give it to me. Brian, please,” I plead. He uses one of his hands to hold me back. He raises his hand with the box in it toward the ceiling and with all the strength he can muster brings the box crashing to the ground.

“Holy shit Justin,” he says as the box bursts open on contact with the hardwood and the contents scatter all over the floor of the spotless loft. 

**

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Daphne asks me. She steps out onto the porch and pulls her door closed behind her.

“I told you I wasn’t going to back down. I really do want to get to know you,” I tell her as I smile at her. She leans against her front door and I watch the cool breeze of early winter blow through her hair. I like when she has it straight. “So, what do you say? Want to come out with me?” I ask her.

“If I go out with you…” she starts as she smiles. “… Will you leave me alone?” she asks me. I put my hands in the pockets of my jacket and look into her eyes. They are brown, shining and deeper than the night. 

“I can’t make any promises, but really, what will it hurt?” I ask her. She holds up her finger, telling me to wait a minute. She goes into the house and comes back out with a thin jacket.

“If you say one fucking thing about Justin, I will kick your fucking ass. You are so damn lucky that I am even agreeing to do this. I must be out of my fucking mind,” she says as she shuts the door completely. I hold out my hand for hers and she reluctantly gives hers to me.

**

“What the fuck is all this shit?” Brian asks me as he bends down to pick up something that fell out of the box. I frantically try to collect all of the items. I crawl on the floor picking up each item one by one. He is watching me. 

“I need to get it all. It’s tainted. It’s all tainted,” I say more to myself than to Brian. “FUCK,” I scream as I grab onto a razor that has come uncovered in the frenzy. I drop the object from my tight grasp and I don’t even see it hit the floor but I hear it. It vibrates through my body, into my veins and down my spine. I sit back on my legs and watch the blood as it pools into my palm and trickles down my arm and onto the floor. 

I feel strong arms grab me and move me toward the kitchen sink. ‘We wash the dishes here,’ flies through my mind. I see the water as it tries to wash the blood away but the cut is deep and relentless. I feel the material press into my palm and as the red soaks into the white cloth, I feel. 

**

“Shaun, I said I would come out with you. I did not say that I was going to make out with you,” Daphne tells me. I hear the slur in her speech and marvel at the quick effects of the drug. I ignore her as I move my hand higher up her leg. “I said stop it,” she says as she pushes me away from her. She takes the door handle into her hand and pulls on it. I smile as she turns to look at me.

“Don’t you just love childproof locks?” I say.

**

I don’t even think he registers the bright white lights of the hospital. “I don’t think it’s too bad but I couldn’t stop it from bleeding,” I tell the nurse. I am holding onto Justin’s right hand, pressing the blood soaked cloth onto the wound. She looks at the bloody towel and at the blood that is still coming through it.

“Come on back, we need to stop the bleeding,” she says. I walk with her into the back with Justin following blindly. I am amazed that she is not asking about my relation to him. She leaves us in the back to wait for the doctor. 

**

I didn’t know that an unconscious person was going to be so fucking heavy. I pull Daphne from the car and drag her over to the side of the building. No one ever comes over here by the old liquor store anyway. I throw her jacket down on top of her along with her purse and after one final glance I walk back to the car. I climb into the driver’s seat and look at her body as the headlights sweep over her. I drive away from her, never noticing the small amounts of blood that stain the car. 

**

“How did you cut yourself?” The doctor asks me. 

“Can’t you just fix him without the fucking twenty questions?” I hear Brian asks. I watch the doctor and Brian exchange words and then Brian kisses my head and walks through the curtain. I am alone with the doctor and I feel… open.

“Justin, how did you hurt your hand?” He asks me. I focus my eyes on him and swallow down the real answer. 

“I was… I was cleaning a glass and I dropped it in the sink and umm, it broke and I reached in the water to pull the plug out the sink and I must have cut myself on a piece of broken glass,” I say. I see him looking at me, into me and I shrink inside myself. I look past the doctor and I see me, I am laughing. I feel the gurney I am sitting on shift and I look to my left. There I am again. I watch myself reach out to touch my shoulder and I flinch.

“Hold still,” the doctor says as he flushes the wound. I didn’t even notice that he wasn’t watching me anymore. “Justin, do you want to tell me how you _really_ cut your hand?” He asks as he puts down the saline solution and grabs the sutures. “This is a double sided wound, the kind you wound get from say a double edged knife or… a double edged razor blade,” he says softly. 

“You might as well tell him, he already knows,” I tell myself. I shake my head no and banish the others from the room. Now it is just me and him.

**

I am sitting out here holding onto Justin’s cell phone, wondering if I should call his mother. I flip the phone open at the same time that it starts to vibrate. I swallow and press it to my ear. “Yeah,” I say. I hear a sweet but firm voice on the other line.

“I’m sorry. I must have dialed the wrong…”

“No, you dialed the right number. Is this Jennifer Taylor?” I ask as I move away from the nurse’s station. “If he needs me can you just tell him I stepped out to take a phone call,” I tell the nurse. When she nods I walk the rest of the way outside and breathe in deeply as I take in the cold air.

“Who is this?” She asks me. 

“My name is Brian Kinney. I am Justin’s, umm… I have been spending a lot of time with Justin and I think we need to talk,” I say. 

“What exactly would we need to talk about what Mr. Kinney? Where is Justin? Is he okay?” She rolls off. I run a hand through my hair and watch as a pregnant woman makes her way into the hospital.

“That depends on what you consider okay. How fast can you get to Mercy hospital?” I ask her.

**

My body aches all over and all I can see is the darkened sky. I place my hands flat on the ground and try to push myself up into a sitting position. I feel my hand slide a little and when I hold it up to my face, straining to catch it in a little of the moonlight, I see blood. I feel myself start to shake and I can hear the moans and feel the tears coming from me. Violation.

* * *

Thank you to my beta Carly.


	12. Rose Water

Okay, I ask the question again. Who needs/wants POV’s? LOL.  
I had them in this chapter and it killed it, but, if they are wanted or needed I shall provide. Just let me know.

* * *

I watch the doctor as he silently wraps the bandage around my hand. I let out a loud sigh and swing my legs back and forth as I wait for him to finish. "You are going to have to change this dressing and clean the wound. I want to see you back here in a week to make sure that it is healing properly and doesn't get infected," he tells me as he finishes and goes to wash his hands. 

"Okay," I say as I get down off the table and move toward the door. 

"Justin, could you come back here for a minute?" he asks as he turns from the small sink area and sits back down on the rolling stool he was using. I let go of the door handle and move back to sit on the gurney. Shit, I was almost out the door. 

We can both see it. It is like a fly in the room, and the longer we stay silent the louder the buzzing becomes. I am watching him watch me and I feel the heat travel to my face. 'Please don't ask me anything,' is all that is running through my mind. I am fixed. I just want to leave. He swivels that small stool until he is right in front of me, level with my face. 

I stare into his eyes as he looks at me, they are green and bright. "Justin, I don't believe that this was an accident," he says as he motions toward my hand. "I have been looking over your records. This is not the first time you have been in here in the past couple of months. I also noticed that there is another superficial wound on your arm, slightly above your wrist," he tells me. 

Wait, pause, rewind and press play. I am so fucked. 

**

"I know, this is so fucked," I tell Jennifer as she sits across from me. I look around the outside waiting area and then turn my head back to her. I watch her as she tries to process what I am telling her. What I have told her. She is shaking her head. 

"I didn't see it," she says just slightly above a whisper. "He is my son and I didn't see it." I pull a cigarette from behind my ear and lean forward a little, resting my arms on my knees as I light it. 

"Yeah well, you were too busy," I say as I blow some smoke out and sit all the way back. She turns her head toward me and I can see the need to protest building in her. She doesn't want anyone to question her position as a mother. She doesn't want anyone to suggest that her parenting skills, at least as of late, have been less than stellar. Well, I am not just anyone.

"You know, you told me all these things about Justin, but, you never told me exactly who you are Mr. umm… Mr. Kinney," she says with a faint trace of superiority rimming her eyes. I take a long pull off my cigarette and think about what I am to Justin as I let the smoke escape my lungs. I lick my lips slowly and turn to look at her again.

"It's Brian… and I don't intend to," I say as I get up and throw the cigarette butt on the ground, grinding it out with my foot as I turn to go inside.

**

"What you are doing is dangerous," he tells me as I pace from one wall of the small room to the other, trying to wrap my head around everything.

"I am eighteen years old," I say. It is the only protest I can make at this point. "I am eighteen years old and if I don't want to talk to you I don't have to." I scratch at the back of my neck and I can feel the tension building under my skin. I can feel the need to release it building under my skin and I shift a little.

"Justin, I really think that you should talk to…" he tries to tell me. I roll my eyes and look toward the ceiling and then back down again. I see me sitting on the gurney, watching the doctor intensely. I blink myself away. I am not there. There is only one of me. 

"Whatever. I didn't come here to have you tell me what to do. I came so that you could fix my hand and you did, so can I go now?" I ask as I stand there. 

**

I take a deep breath and try to stop my body from shaking. I pull my bottom lip into my mouth when I feel a sharp pain run through me. "Fuck," I say out loud as the pain comes to a numbing end, reminding me that it is there, waiting to pounce again. I lean against the side of the dumpster as I try to stop my head from pounding. I look down at my legs and realize that they are bare. I look around for my pants, I can't find them. 

I start to panic. I look at the spot on my leg where my hand touched, blood is all over my skin and I start to hyperventilate. Blood, it’s on my legs, my hands and all over the ground. It's coming from me. I see my purse sitting on its side, all the contents spilled out. I don't focus on any of them. I train my eyes on the blinking red light that is telling me that my phone is on. 

I pick up the small device and close my fingers around it. I try not to think of the blood that is staining the surface as I hold it in my grasp. My mind is blank. I can't think of anyone to call. I don't want to call my parents, who would? I press the speed dial for the only person I know I can trust.

**

I am standing off to the side talking to a nurse about Justin and I feel his phone start to vibrate in my pocket. I look at the display and answer. "Hey Daphne," I say to Justin's best friend. I met her about three weeks ago and liked her right away. She is the perfect match for Justin. If he was straight I could see them together. I wait for her to answer but all I hear are stunted breaths of air and crying. "Daphne… Daphne, are you okay?" I ask into the phone. I hear a deep inhalation and wait.

"Brian… Brian, is that you?" she asks quietly. I watch as Jennifer comes inside and goes over to the nurse's desk. She speaks with the nurse and then sits down in one of the plastic chairs, waiting for Justin.

"Yeah, it's me. I am holding Justin's phone for him. Is something wrong?" I ask her. 

"I need help," she says. I stand still. 'When it rains, it pours,' goes through my mind. "I don't know where I am. I am scared and there is blood everywhere," she spills out. I feel all the tension leave my body as her cries reach through the phone. "I can't get up," she says through the tears.

"Daphne, do you see a street sign somewhere near you?" I ask as I run a hand through my hair. Silence. Nothing. "Daphne, are you still there?" 

"I think I see something that says Tioga Avenue. I'm not sure, it's dark and I can't really see," she breathes out. I can hear her voice shake as it leaves her. I know where that is. I know exactly where that is. 

"I'm on my way," I tell her as I close the phone. "Hey, I need you to go back there and tell Justin that Daphne needs me and that it's an emergency," I tell the young girl. She smiles up at me and nods her head. "Give him this and tell him to take a cab back to the loft," I tell her as I hand her some cash and turn to walk away. I turn back around and walk back over to her, "Give him his phone and tell him to call me," I say as I hand the phone to her and watch as she disappears into the back of the emergency room. 

I leave out of the hospital and hop into the car. I pull out of the parking space and head over to Tioga Avenue as fast as I can. I am glad it is late, there are not many other cars on the street and I get here fast. I pull my car over to the curb and get out. I walk a little down the street until I come to the corner. I look around. You can see the street sign from anywhere near here. I peer into the darkness, looking for anything. I turn my body a little to the left and see a little movement. 

I move toward the building and stop short when I see Daphne. "Holy shit," I mutter under my breath. I move closer to the girl and when my foot kicks a rock she jumps. She seems to finally realize that she is not alone and as she fuses her brown eyes with my hazel ones she starts to cry again; her tears fresh and new. I move over to her swiftly. "Fuck, what happened?" I ask her.   
_  
"Shit, I didn't think it was really going to work," Brad says as he helps me carry Daphne's drugged body up the stairs. We drop her down on my bed where she tries, without much success to get up, get out._

_"Yeah, at first I thought I gave her too much because it worked so fast," I tell him. We watch as Daphne tries to say something, but, nothing comes out._

_"No man, I told you she'd be okay. It was just a little bit," Brad says as he walks up to the bed and sits down next to her. "Take my picture," he says as he pulls a digital camera out of his wallet. I don't think it's such a good idea but I reach out and grab the camera. I take numerous pictures of him and Daphne. I even let him take a couple of Daphne and me. I give the camera back to him and watch as he puts it in his pocket. I move away from the bed and go into the closet really quick to hang up my jacket._

_"Kiss her, go ahead," I say when I come out of the closet. I watch as Brad covers her mouth with his. In one swift movement I see Daphne punch him in the side of the face. "Shit," I say as Brad hits her back, repeatedly. Fuck, it wasn't supposed to happen like this._  
  
I look at the blood that is on the ground around her and I wonder where it is all coming from, until I realize that she is not wearing any pants. It appears as if she is not wearing anything from the waist down. I see the blood staining her thighs and her legs. I also see the familiar sight of cum, mingling along her body, shining in the little bit of light that is kissing her skin. I close my eyes and open them quickly. 

She still looks the same. I am afraid to touch her. I am afraid to move her. Her eye is swelling and there are scratch marks on her skin and a large gash on her arm. "I think we should call an ambulance," I say. I see her tense.

"No, I don't want to go in an ambulance. I don't want to go to the hospital," she tells me. I look her up and down again. I look at all the blood.

"Daphne, you need an ambulance. There is blood everywhere. The police can come and get evidence," I say as I kneel down beside her. 

"Will you stay here with me?"

"Yeah," I tell her. She nods her head and lets me call an ambulance. I hang up when I am assured that they are on the way. It seems like forever, but it has only been a few minutes. I watch Daphne as the shock of the events and the loss of blood start to affect her. "Hey… hey, stay with me beautiful," I say as she starts to close her eyes. She is leaning against the dumpster and as the ambulance pulls into the parking lot she slips away.

**

I pull the door open and walk out of the back. I run into a nurse who looks like she is no older than I am. I take my phone and the money from her and listen as she gives me the message from Brian. I nod my head, say thank you and keep moving. I stop short when I see my mother sitting in one of the chairs and I have no idea what I am supposed to do. "What are you doing here?" I ask as I move past her.

She gets up and follows me out of the hospital. "Justin, why didn't you tell me something was wrong?" She asks me. I don't answer her. I pull out my cell phone and call for a cab. "I would have helped you," she says. I laugh out loud to that and sit down to wait for my cab. She sits next to me. I roll my eyes and pull my cigarettes out of my pocket and light one. "You know, you really shouldn't smoke," she says as I blow some smoke out. I want her to go away. "I can take you home Justin," she says.

"No thank you," I tell her. "I'm not going to the house." She goes silent. 'What mom, have you run out of shit to say,' I think.

"Justin, you have to come home." Fuck... that.

"Why? I haven't been home in a week and you sure as hell haven't seemed to mind. You can go home now," I tell her as I see my cab turning into the hospital parking lot. 'Fuck,' I think as I stand up and realize that it's not my cab. I watch the man three benches away get in the cab and I take another pull off of my cigarette. I hate that. I hate when you deliver a really good burn and get ready to leave; then you realize that you have misjudged the situation and now you are forced to sit in the afterglow of your wicked flame.

I sit back down and run my fingers along the healing scar on my arm. "Justin, I know that I haven't been paying too much attention to you but..."

"You never answered my question. What are you doing here?" 

"I called your cell and Brian answered," she tells me and I drop the cigarette. It never occurred to me how she would have known where I was. I just never thought about it. I study the grooves in the sidewalk as I slowly grind out the fire. I fold my arms, making sure I don’t press on my wounded hand and lean forward a little. “Is he your boyfriend Justin?” She asks me. I hear laughing and I see myself out the corner of my eye. 

‘Boyfriend is such a cemented word. I mean we fuck all the time, but boyfriend…’ I hear myself say. I look over at my mother and smile. “I wouldn’t go that far,” is all I offer her. Ask me no questions… I’ll tell you no lies.

I watch another cab come into the parking lot and this time I wait a little longer before getting up and walking over to it. I open the door. I look back at her and wonder. Am I being too harsh, too stubborn… too childish? No… maybe… probably. Shit, I don’t know. It’s almost three in the morning, way too early for ‘The amazing analysis of Justin Taylor.’ “Justin… Justin,” she yells as the cab pulls away from the curb.

“Tremont,” I tell the driver. I am suddenly sleepy, and hungry.

**

I can see the light as it shines in to my eyes and I feel myself jolt back to the waking world. “Hey, welcome back,” the paramedic says to me. I see Brian standing slightly behind them, letting them work. “Okay, we are going to get you onto the stretcher and to the hospital,” the paramedic tells me. 

Brian walks over to me when I am situated on the stretcher and gives me his hand. I hold onto it tightly and he never complains. I know I am hurting him, I can see his hand turning colors as my grip intensifies but he stays silent. He stays supportive. He stays. 

“Can I ride with her?” He asks.

“Yeah, that should be fine,” the shorter paramedic says as they pull the stretcher into the air and wheel me toward the ambulance. 

“What do you got for me?” The trauma doctor asks the taller paramedic as we wheel into the hospital. He looks at his chart and reads off what it says. 

“We have an African- American female, multiple injuries and possible rape. She lost consciousness twice on the way and appears to be in a minor stage of shock. She was found on the street,” he says. I try to close my ears. I don’t want to hear him but his voice comes through loud and clear. I hold on to Brian’s hand as we move through the hallway toward the private examination room.

**

I slide the loft door open and throw my key on the counter after I close the door and lock up. I wonder what Daphne needed Brian for. I called her while I was in the cab but the phone just went to voicemail. I walk over to the bedroom, stepping over all of the stuff that is still on the floor. I’ll clean it up tomorrow. I drop down on the bed and close my eyes. 

The last thing I see is me. I am facing me, so close to myself that I can hardly breathe. “You know, if you keep ignoring your problems, you won’t have too many more tomorrows,” I tell myself. I close my eyes and roll over onto my other side, facing the bathroom. There I am again. “You’re fine, you don’t have a problem,” I say. I close my eyes and when I hear nothing I open them again. I smooth my left hand over the bandage on my right as I lay on my side. I close my eyes and let the darkness swallow me. 

Right now… during these couple of hours of sleep… I am flawless.

* * *

Thank you to my beta Carly. Thank you to anyone who listened to me bitch and moan about this chapter. Thank you to my mom who fucked up my flow when she pointed something out to me, causing me to have to stop production and rethink practically everything. *sarcastically* THANKS A LOT MOM. Thanks to Cam for helping me work out details that are not in this chapter.


	13. Rose Water

Italics are flashbacks from two weeks ago.

* * *

_  
“Shit, I think I just heard someone open the front door,” I say. Brad doesn’t hear me. He is too busy rolling another joint. We have already had more than two and I am starting to feel like I am floating. I put down the beer in my hand and walk over to my dresser. I look at myself in the mirror and then at the reflection of Brad and Daphne on the floor. He moved her to the floor. I don’t remember when, or why. “I am gonna go and check,” I say._

_“Whatever man,” he says. I walk out the door and close it behind me._

_“God, they were just stopping in to get the tickets. They left again,” I say as I step through the door. I don’t hear anything but the smell that is tainting the air is unmistakable. It smells like sex, alcohol and marijuana. Sex, why does it smell like sex? FUCK._

_I walk toward the bed and with a racing heart I walk around the structure, slowly. Brad is on top of Daphne, snoring softly. She isn’t moving. From her position under Brad’s heavy form I can’t even tell if she is breathing. “What the fuck did you do?” I yell out. My heart is pounding. Shit just got seriously out of control. The buzz that I had is effectively… gone._

_“I don’t know what happened man,” Brad tells me drunkenly. I pull over in the parking lot of the old liquor store and fling my door open. “What are you doing?” I sit there with my one leg on the ground outside, pressing a perfect footprint into the dirt._

_“What the fuck do you mean what am I doing?” I ask. “You raped her. You beat the shit out of her and I was there. I went to her house. I drugged her. So what, you want to call the police? I can just see it now. Oh officer, we didn’t mean to hurt her. We just drugged her for no reason,” I yell at him. I can feel the sweat and the heat coming off of my skin._

_“We didn’t do it on purpose. It was just supposed to scare her,” he tells me. I know all that. He looks in the back at Daphne’s lifeless form. Her arm is still bleeding from where he pulled her off the bed and banged it on the furniture. I can remember everything now. Damn her for being so fragile. “Plus, it was all your idea. You just wanted to make Taylor pissed,” he says. I narrow my eyes at him and get out of the car. I pull open the backdoor and start to pull Daphne out, along with her purse and jacket. “Aren’t you going to help me?” I ask. He says nothing._

_“I’m sorry,” I whisper as I sit her on the side of the abandoned building, close to the dumpster. I turn around and walk back to the car. I can see Brad’s form in the front seat, sitting still and chewing nervously on his fingernails. I close the back door and then get in the front. I put the car into gear and drive off. The ride back to my place is silent. We have run out of things to say to each other.  
_  
**

“Do you have anything that you want to say?” he asks me. I look around the hospital room before setting my eyes back on him. I don’t have anything to say. He keeps asking me if I have anything to say. If I had something to say I would open my fucking mouth. “The doctor is going to discharge you today,” he says. ‘Leave me alone dad,’ I think. I watch the door open and when I see the doctor come in I sit back a little.

“Hello Daphne, how are you feeling today?” I smile. A smile is all I can do without losing my mind. I tense up and relax as he checks me. I don’t like people touching me. He writes some things down in his chart. “Everything seems to be fine and I am sure that your dad told you that we are going to let you out today,” he says with a smile. He sighs heavily and looks from me to my dad. “Mr. Chanders… could you leave us alone for a minute?” He asks my dad.

“Daphne,” he starts when my dad is out the door. “You have been in the hospital for two weeks and you haven’t said a word. You know, sometimes, it helps for you to talk about what happened,” he tells me. I look at his white doctor’s jacket. Is that what that is called, a doctor’s jacket? I don’t know. In about ten seconds I won’t care. ‘Look doctor, I know you want to help but you can’t. You have no idea how I feel. Leave me alone,’ I think as I turn away from him and close my eyes. “Okay,” he says and I hear the door open and close. I want to crawl inside my skin and vanish.

**

I flex my hand gently. Sometimes the skin around the scar gets tight, but at least I can hold a pencil again. I flip to a fresh sheet in my sketchbook and the white seems to glow in the winter sun. It got cold so fast. I burrow my face a little further into my scarf and watch some of the other students on the field. Shaun and some of the other guys are playing flag football. I notice that Shaun and Brad are not talking as much as they used to. Jeffrey seems confused about everything but he has a girlfriend now so he really doesn’t care. “Hey Justin,” I hear and I immediately clinch my teeth together.

“Hey Vicki,” I say. I really don’t like her. She is always talking to people who don’t want to talk to her. I think that’s a little weird but Vicki doesn’t seem to care. “What do you want?” Shit, why did I ask her that? Now she is going to sit down next to me. Did I mention that I don’t like her?

“I heard about Daphne,” she says as she sits on the wall next to me. She is on my left side. “Can you move over here?” I ask motioning to the right. She looks at me confused for a minute. ‘You are sitting in Daphne’s spot,’ I think. “You are in my light,” I give to her. She shrugs her shoulders and moves to the other side. My back is facing her. She doesn’t care, she keeps right on talking. 

“Everyone is saying that she is pregnant and that her parents are making her stay in the house until the baby is born,” she says. I press my pencil to the fresh sheet of paper and start making random doodles. Ignore them and they go away.  
 __  
I can feel the bed dip behind me and I smile. I open one eye and take in the time. Fuck, it is ten in the morning. I feel a heated hand still carrying a slight chill touch my face. “Mmm… your hand is cold,” I mutter sleepily. I turn over and look at Brian. He is on his side, facing me. His eyes are wide open, staring and thinking. I take his hand in mine and kiss the back of it. I press my lips to his and lose myself in our kiss. I am almost floating. I am almost in the air… and then, I pop.

_He pushes me back and I look into his eyes. I don’t see sadness, remorse, guilt or enjoyment. I am thankful for that. I press my body in closer to his and what I see in him, what I feel in him is pure… hesitation. I can see his need to say something, to tell me something. ‘Fucking spit it out,’ runs through my mind but I wait. I will always wait. He waits for me. “What’s wrong?” I ask softly. I press my forehead to his and close my eyes. His breath is warm and comforting._

_‘Tell me… Oh my god, SAY SOMETHING… say anything… fine, I’ll say something,’ I think. “Hey, what was the problem with Daphne?” He brings a hand up and runs his fingers through my hair._

_“Justin,” he says. Why do people say your name before telling you something bad? It doesn’t make you feel better about the situation. “Daphne is in the hospital,” he says and it’s all I hear, it’s all I need to hear._

_“What?” I almost choke on the question. I don’t know what to do. I move away from Brian and get off of the bed. I walk out of the bedroom and down the steps, pausing at the bottom. There is still stuff on the floor; a painful reminder of my own problems, my own demons. Shift focus._

_I bend down and start to pick up the things on the floor. I can hardly see through my unshed tears. I can hardly hear through my pain. I move around slowly, placing everything in a pile. “Visiting hours start at noon. You can go see her then,” Brian says as he moves to the bottom of the steps. I don’t have to see him to know that he is exhausted. I don’t have to look at him to know that dealing with me, is starting to press in on him. “I can drive you over,” he offers. I shake my head._

_“No, you’re tired. Go to sleep. I can take the bus,” I tell him. I finish picking up everything and when I turn around he is sleep and the clock reads 11:47 a.m. Great. Time flies.  
_  
“That is such bullshit,” I say to Vicki. ‘Go away bitch,’ I think. She sits right where she is. I fight the urge to correct the rumors. It’s an urge I have been fighting to control for two weeks. I stop drawing. Brian’s face is staring up at me. I close the book before she can see and hold it flat on my lap.

“Yeah well, that’s what everyone is saying,” she says as she crosses her legs at the ankles and swings them back and forth. I look up at her as she looks dreamily at the guys playing football and I wallow in the momentary silence. She really is a beautiful girl. I think it only makes you hate her more, for being excessively pretty and equally annoying. I fight the urge to put her image onto paper. “Why do you wear long sleeves all the time?” Okay, that was not expected. I press the tip of my tongue between my teeth. Peer relations. 

“Why do you give a fuck what I wear?” I ask as I tease the pages of my sketchbook with my fingertips. I can see her. I watch her shift. I watch her scratch at some invisible something just above her right eye. I watch her… temporarily speechless. I can’t resist. I have to say something. “Oh my god, are you actually speechless? You, of all people, can’t think of something to say?” I laugh, hard.

“I used to do the same thing,” she says. It comes out fast. It comes out nervously. It comes out in a whisper; a heavy whisper that is filled with everything she owns. Seven words and they, for some reason, mean so much to me. I am not the only one. I am not alone. I turn my body toward her, placing my sketchbook under my leg. 

I watch the sheets rage against the wind for a moment before looking into some of the deepest eyes I have ever seen. They seem to glow and penetrate into me. They are so rich and from the angle the sun is hitting her, they are a color that rivals the deepest indigo. It’s a trick of the light, I know, but it is beautiful.

“I’m scared,” I let go from my lips. She scoots a little closer to me and folds her arms around her torso. She cocks her head to the side and lets out a breath as she looks at me. I watch the heat from her breath mix with the cold air to form a wispy white cloud. She smiles kindly, sympathetically… painfully. 

“Yeah well… we all get a little scared sometimes,” she tells softly me as she drinks me in. Maybe Vicki is not so bad.  
 __  
“Hey,” I say as I walk into Daphne’s hospital room. I am happy to be here for someone other than me. I give her a weak smile as I close the door and walk toward the bed. She watches my every movement. She is black and blue. The light of the hospital and the natural light of the sun are only serving to amplify her condition.

_I tap on her covered toe gently as I walk over to sit next to her bed. She settles her eyes on me. I can tell one was swollen but seems to be better. What a difference a couple of hours make. “Are you going to tell me what happened? You know you have to, we tell each other everything,” I say with a smile. She is silent._

_I can see the water just inside of her eyes and I get up out of the plastic chair. I get on the bed next to her and kiss her on the cheek. She takes a deep breath and with all her effort moves over a little. I put one arm around her and pull her hair out of her face. “You… are… beautiful,” I whisper into her ear and just like that… the tears let go. She turns into me, as much as her body will allow, and all I can do is hold her.  
_  
**

“Where in the hell have you been the past couple of weeks?” Mikey asks me as he comes through my door. I look at him briefly before saying anything.

“Mikey, so nice to see you,” I say sarcastically as I look over some proofs for the art department. “I didn’t know you were coming by. To what do I owe the pleasure?” I ask him. I see his arms cross and his lip stick out and I am already dreading anything that is going to come out of his mouth.

“I missed you. I keep calling and Cynthia either says you are not here or that you are in a meeting. I call the loft and you never answer, so I figured…”

“You figured you would come and find out what I have been up to,” I finish for him as he sits in one of the chairs in front of my desk. He huffs at my conclusion and sits back in the chair. 

“Do you want to come out to Babylon with us tonight?” He asks. Is he kidding me? Of course I want to go. Hell, after almost two weeks without fucking Justin, I need to go. I want to open my mouth to say yeah, but honestly, I am too fucking tired to do much of anything. I debate going with him. I make the final decision to tell him yes. Hell, I deserve a break.

“I don’t feel like it tonight Mikey. I guess you’ll have to watch over the kingdom without me,” I say. What the fuck was that? I was going to go with them. Mikey isn’t pleased. I don’t really care. 

“But Brian, we haven’t spent any time together in the past couple of weeks. I want to hang out,” he tells me. I am saved from answering. 

“Brian, Talusa international wants to see you as soon as you are available,” she tells me. 

“Umm, set up a meeting with them for tomorrow. You can put them before the meeting with…”

“They are in the lobby. They mean _right_ when you become available,” she tells me. I live for this rush. Mikey seems like he is caught up in a tornado. I get up from behind the desk and walk over behind him. I tap him on the shoulder firmly.

“I would love to continue this amazing conversation but… I need to go be brilliant so you need to go,” I tell him. He leaves after another five minutes of pouting. I look at myself in the mirror and move out of my office. Go in for the kill. 

**

I step off the elevator and walk over to Daphne’s room. I see her father and mother talking quietly to each other down the hall. I wave when they glance over and notice me. Mr. Chanders glares. I know that look. That’s the look that says, I can’t really stand you but my daughter likes you so I will pretend to be okay with you. Mrs. Chanders smiles and waves back. Her smile is genuine. I push open the door to Daphne’s room and close it door behind me. “Hey,” I say. She smiles at me. “Well, are you ready to go home?”

I move off of her bed and over to her window. I pull open the curtain and let the light in. “Have you been waiting to get discharged for a long time?” I ask. I know that she probably has. Hospitals take forever with that shit. They don’t want you to come in but fuck if they make getting out any easier. I talk to her non-stop and when her mother comes back into the room with the doctor I let the conversation drift away.

“Okay Daphne, we are all set for you to go. Here is a prescription for the medication that you will need to take,” the doctor says. I watch as she gives Daphne more and more instructions. The prescription pad seems to be filled. Mrs. Chanders is standing just behind the doctor and I can tell that she feels slightly left out. She has no say in anything and I know that it must bother her. There is the flickering light of helplessness behind her eyes. I feel bad for her. 

“Could you please excuse us for a moment?” the doctor asks. Mrs. Chanders does not want to leave but she does. I move to stand up and I feel Daphne’s hand clamp down on mine. I stay where I am.

“Daphne, I am going to leave you the name of a very good therapist. I think she can help and I really think that you should consider talking to her,” the doctor says. Daphne just stares straight ahead. She must know every inch of that wall by now. I take the number from the doctor and wait as he lets himself out. 

“Well Daphne, are you ready to go home?” Mrs. Chanders asks. I can tell that Daphne wants to be anywhere but here, but home, is not exactly the first place on her list. I hold her hand and walk with her out of the hospital. 

**

Justin has not stopped talking since he sat down. Even when Debbie came and took our orders he talked. Now he is quiet, thinking. “Brian, do you think I need to see someone?” He asks out of the blue. The peaceful cloud of silence that was floating just above the table has just evaporated. I did not expect to be answering this question here, now, in the diner. Shit.

“See someone for what?” I ask. I know for what but I want to be clear, crystal clear. I want him to say the words. I want him to really ask. He looks at me. He knows me now and he knows what I want him to say.

“You know for what. For the…” he stops to look around and see who is watching him. He needs to know if anyone can hear him. “… problem that I have,” he finishes in a whisper. He is nervous. I see the air leave him as he acknowledges that this problem may be bigger than him. I want to know where the need to know came from but I don’t ask. I am about to answer him when he keeps going. I press my back into the booth. “Daphne got out of the hospital today. She still isn’t talking and the doctor gave her all of this medication and a number to a therapist,” he says as he takes a drink from his glass and looks up at me.

‘I am listening, go on,’ I think. I raise my eyebrow a little, silently urging for him to tell me the rest. Confidant.

“When the doctor was in the room talking to Daphne I looked at her mother. I mean, I am used to seeing her mother, but this time… this time it was different. It was almost like she was dead and still breathing. Like she was some shell of a person. You could tell how tired she was from dealing with everything. Well, not really dealing with everything but having to stand on the side and watch as her daughter tries to,” he says. I have to really concentrate to understand what he is trying to say. I wonder if he even knows.

“Justin, what…”

“What I am trying to say,” he says as he squirms. He stops talking and stares for a long moment at the fork on the table. I see his hand rise up to scratch at the back of his neck and I slowly reach out my hand and slide the fork away, along with the knife next to it. Better safe than sorry. Nervous contemplation can breed… the bitter beginnings of stupidity.

“I mean, that look that was on Daphne’s mother’s face was like torture. Sometimes… sometimes, I see that look on you. I see how you struggle between love and exhaustion and it makes me feel…” he tells me. “I don’t want to be the cause of that look. I want to see you look at me the way you did when you first saw me,” he says.

I let his eyes dance with mine as the sounds of the diner melt away. It is only us. “When I saw you for the first time, you shifted in and out of focus. You seemed to almost glow. I didn’t see your imperfections,” I tell him.

“And now?” He asks. I roll my lips into my mouth and release them slowly. I take a drink of my water.

“Now, well… now I still see you. You haven’t changed. I just see… all of you,” I say. He wipes a tear away before it even lets itself begin the decent down his face. He doesn’t want to cry, not now, not here. “I’ll help you find someone.” He doesn’t say anything. He just nods and takes another sip of his drink. He doesn’t need to speak. I don’t need to speak. The air is too thick and too much is filling it. Silence… silence is good. Sometimes not saying anything, says it all.

The noise of the diner fills my ears again. We keep our eyes on each other. Everything is back in our atmosphere and still it is only us. We call the shots. We make the rules.


	14. Rose Water

AN: This chapter is written a little differently. At least, it seems that way to me. The only explanation I have is two cups of coffee and three cans of Pepsi. I was wired out of my fucking mind. LMAO. Enjoy. Thank you to my lovely beta Carly.

* * *

Everything happens for a reason. Does it, is that really true? Does it apply to all situations? I wonder. I am spinning through my life… and I wonder. Things happen for a reason, hmmm. I went to see Daphne at her house. She wouldn’t see me. She wouldn’t see anyone. Try, try… try again. 

Can I die without dying?

Can I live and not breathe the air?

Can I exist without… sex, food, water, clothes, family… friends?

Can I close my eyes… and… see… it… all? Expansion of time and space. 

Can I step outside myself and see? Can I live inside myself and not… suffocate? Subtle… acute… oxygen deprivation… Asphyxiate. Not yet.   
_  
Free… Falling…_

_I let go of Brian’s hand as the diner comes back into focus. When did we put our hands together? We sit here, comfortable in the company of one another. Brian doesn’t mind silence. He dwells in it. He can appreciate the need to… not… say… anything. Have I told you that before? I love that. Debbie brings our food over and sits it in front of us. I am not hungry anymore. “I know what you’re thinking, eat it,” Brian says. I look up at him and he is looking at me._

_“You aren’t eating,” I point out. He gives a silent laugh and nods. I want him to make a long impressive speech about how I need to eat to keep my strength up. I want him to come over to my side of the table and feed me just to make sure I eat all the food. He stays where he is._

_I want him to do all the things that my mother would do. I hate her and love her so much at the same time but Brian is not my mother. I miss my mother but she doesn’t need to know that. Hell, no one needs to know that. Do I really miss her or do I just miss the idea of her? I don’t know._

_“Yeah,” he says. Is that all he is going to say? I look down at my plate. I sigh as I reach for the ketchup. I may as well eat. I squeeze the ketchup onto my plate and it looks like something died. Something did die. I eat everything. Brian drinks his coffee and watches as the people move around the diner. When we leave he slings his arm around me, pulling me into him. He smells like… life. I love it. I brace myself for change… it’s in the wind._

_We walk into the loft and he closes the door and sets the alarm. I don’t feel trapped here. Do I feel freedom? He walks right over to the computer, tossing his jacket onto the sofa as he goes. He sits down at the computer and turns it on. The screen seems to light him up completely, inside and out. “What are you doing?” I ask. He crosses his legs at the ankles and starts to search._

_“I am looking for someone,” he says. I shrug out of my shirt and walk up to the desk. Facing him… wanting him… needing him… not feeling him. Is this sexual rejection?_

_“You don’t have to look now,” I say. I don’t want to deal with this right now. I don’t want to look on the internet for counselors. I don’t want to look for therapists. I don’t want to look for psychologists and psychiatrists. Psychiatrists, do I need medication? It is late. Too much has happened. My brain can’t function. I settle on the couch and mindlessly go through the motions of agreeing and disagreeing with him about different people. “It can wait,” I say._

_“No, it can’t,” he tells me. So we go through the many lists… pages and pages of names. We settle on ten. Team Work._  
  
Transition… or life moves on without you. Keep up… or fade away.

I can breathe. 

I can breathe. 

I can breathe. 

I die. 

I live. 

I can breathe and the air is… sweet. Resurrection. 

I almost feel like I am suffocating. There is no air in this room and it feels like the walls are closing in on me. I am sitting in the office of Dr. Walter Ettenger. It sounds like the last name of someone who owns a paint company. I don’t want to talk to him. Now I smell paint. It’s all psychological. His desk is the kind you would find in your school guidance counselors office. I want to kick the desk just to hear the noise it will make. 

I am sitting across from this man and I want to punch him. I wonder what he’d look like with a broken nose. He is an asshole. I look at the wall behind him. There is a cobweb on the wall. It is moving and it takes up all my attention. This is the third counselor I have seen and I have hated them all. “What are you thinking right now?” He asks me. I could choke.

“Why do you want to know?” I ask. I don’t like him. I am being difficult. I wonder for a moment if he even knows what he is talking about. I don’t think he does. I think he likes the idea of himself speaking and it makes me hate him more. Sometimes silence is enough. He wants me to start talking about my mother and father and that’s all I can take. I get up out the chair and walk out of his office. 

We make the rules. 

We make the rules, but when I am alone, when it is just me… the rules are mine to break. 

I have that weightless feeling in the pit of my stomach. The feeling you get when a roller coaster climbs the first incline, dropping suddenly back down to earth. 

Do you know that feeling? 

You can hear your heartbeat and taste your sweat. You feel like you can die at any moment. You feel out of control, helpless… scared. 

You feel suspended… empty. But you get back in line and ride again. I feel that way.

I walk out of the building and as the warm sun washes over me I take a deep breath. The world is spinning and all of a sudden, I feel… completely. I feel too much. I get on the bus, heading I-don’t-know where. When it stops I see the confines of my neighborhood. When did I stop coming home? I can’t remember. It doesn’t matter. I haven’t been home in what feels like years. It has only been a couple weeks. I feel like an eternity has gone and come again. I step away from the bus stop and start to walk. The houses all look innocent, warm and inviting. 

Is that just a mask? 

Do the true colors of the houses and their occupants lie just under the top coat of paint? Skeletons in the closet… Prescription pills, Xanax… Lithium. Feel better. Ritalin. Affairs… STD’s… Pregnancies… Abortions… Suicides. Drugs, Marijuana, Heroin, Speed, Glue. Aerosols… huffing, huffing, huffing. 

The best of everything, Close the closet door. Upper… Middle… Class. Conspiracy. 

The illusion of pure happiness.

I find myself standing at the bottom of my driveway. The view is different. I can feel the anxiety flush through my system and I bite my bottom lip. I am scared. I don’t know why. I pace and the pressure inside of me is starting to build and build and build. It needs to explode. It needs to release. I look down at the gravel, disturbed by feet and tires. I grab a rock and before I can tell myself to stop I drag the jagged piece of hardened mineral along my arm. I am looking up at the house as I press and I don’t feel anything. I should feel something. Anesthetized. 

**

Pressure.

Pressure.

Pressure.

More than I can take? No. More than I want to deal with? Yes. I let my tongue twist the lyrics of the song that Devlen Henderson wants to hear. “The campaign will be perfect, exactly what you want; increased sales and more exposure,” I tell him. I am weaving a carefully constructed web of bullshit. I love my job. My mask is in place and all my thoughts are on Justin. He is seeing the new counselor today. This is the third one. He is frustrated. I am frustrated. 

Michael wants what I used to be… what he thinks I am.

Lindsay wants my time.

Tricks want my body.

Clients want my business sense.

Justin needs me.

I finish up my meeting and escort them out of the building before going back to my office. I look at all the papers on my desk. I grimace as I realize that I have to sign all of them. “Cynthia, can you bring me the layouts for the Henderson campaign. Now,” I say as I look over some more boards. Cynthia knocks on the door and sets the new boards on the stand in the office.

Cynthia comes over to my desk and stands in front of me. “Leo Brown called. He wants to meet with you to go over the details for the latest campaign. Michael called three times while you were in your meeting. Lindsay called, she wants to know if you and Justin want to come over for dinner,” Cynthia tells me. I am almost surprised to hear that Justin hasn’t called. Not that I want him to call. I do.

“Is that all?” I ask her. She nods and puts the list of calls on my desk. I pick it up and debate calling them back. They can wait, they can all wait. Why isn’t Justin calling?

**

I drop the rock and look down at my arm. It is red and starting to swell. I press my hand down over it like that will stop it from swelling more than it already is. The blood is reaching for a breath of air and I want to suppress it. Make everything all better. I start to walk up the driveway and when I reach the front door… I hesitate. 

I reach into my pocket and pull out my keys. I let the tip of the copper key rest just inside the lock before breathing deep and pushing it all the way in. The smell inside is the same. The feeling is slightly different. You can tell that something is missing, something isn’t right. I walk up the stairs and turn the knob on my door. Nostalgia. 

It’s all clean. Everything is picked up and put away. My mom must have done it. I pause for a minute as I try to think of anything that I might have left out that may have been incriminating. “I cleaned it up. I hope you don’t mind.” I hear my mother speak behind me and I stiffen a little. I thought the house was empty. 

“No, its ok I don’t mind,” I say as I walk further into the room. “I’m sorry,” I tell her. I don’t know why I feel compelled to say I am sorry but I say it and I mean it. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” She asks me. I know what she is talking about. I knew when she asked me at the hospital about him. She tried to act like it was no big deal. It was.

“Tell you what?” I say. I can hear the sharp intact of air into her lungs from her position behind me. I look down at my arm. It is starting to bruise. It is a mangled mass of black, blue, polished white… and red. Brian is going to ask about it. 

“Justin, I saw the pictures. I saw them,” she tells me. I swallow and turn to face her. “I just need to hear you say the actual words. I… I need you to say it,” she tells me. I cross my arms over my chest and look into her eyes. I shrug my shoulders a little and cock my head a little to the side.

“I’m gay.” Is that what you want to hear? I wait for her to make a statement or show some kind of surprise, but I guess she has had time to process it. 

“I know. I told you I saw some pictures of you and other boys. Don’t worry, I didn’t tell your father,” she tells me. She is standing in the doorway, waiting for something. Before I can open my mouth again she speaks. “Why didn’t you tell me about what you are doing to yourself? I am your mother. You should have told me something was bothering you. I would have helped,” she says. Okay, so maybe I didn’t know what she was asking about before, not all of it. She wants more than just a sexual declaration. 

“You are dealing with your own bullshit and I don’t give a shit what you told him,” I tell her. I am suddenly wondering why I came here. It’s almost like I was pulled back. I may as well get some clothes while I am here. I turn away from her and pull open my closet door. There is nothing in here that I really want. “You didn’t need me telling you all my problems,” I say. I am standing in the closet with my hand on a shirt. It’s a decoy. I have no intention of taking the shirt off the hanger. I don’t want to look at her right now. 

“Justin, I am never to busy for….” I cut her off.

 

“Do you know where my sketchbooks are?” Rescue question. I could have at least asked a clothing question. I am standing in the closet. 

“I put them on your desk,” she says. I nod my head and move out of the closet. I go over to the desk and grab all the sketchbooks. “He asks about you,” she says. I snort. I snorted? That is so unattractive. I have to remind myself not to do that anymore. 

“I have a cell phone. He can call it. I may not answer, but he can call,” I tell her. “Have you seen Daphne?” Change the subject. Please, change the subject. 

“I went over to her house. Her mother said that she doesn’t want to see anyone,” she tells me. “She still isn’t talking and the cops think that some boys from the school may be involved, but Daphne won’t talk to anyone,” she says. 

“Yeah,” I say as I get ready to leave the room. She doesn’t want me to go. I can tell. I am leaving anyway. “I am going to go and see her,” I tell her. 

“Good,” she says and lets me out of the room. I walk down the stairs and am almost to freedom when she stops me. “Justin, are you still going to school. You only have about two months left.” Has that much time passed?

“I’m going,” I tell her. I haven’t gone lately. I missed a few days. I’ll go tomorrow. She nods her head. I can sense her sadness. I walk over and hug her. It feels a little weird. Why?

I open the door and step out onto the porch, into the night, darkness swallow me. When did it get so late? “Justin, why don’t you come home for dinner this week, we can talk,” she offers. I don’t trust my heart so I just nod my head. I walk away from her and I can feel her as she watches me.

**

I was waiting for you.

I was worried about you.

Where were you?

Are you okay?

I called the doctor’s office. He said you left the session. Did you like him?

What in the FUCK is that on your arm?

“Hey, long day?” It’s all I say. Masquerade.


	15. Rose Water

I am far removed from pain… consumed by it. I am brave. I am scared of everything. I am without defect… so far from normal. I am terrified of happiness. I am fueled by insecurity, fear. I am utterly… void. I am barely, existing. I am truly… alive. Ambivalence. 

And then… I jump.

**

I have been in my room for so long now. I am starting to question my ability to leave. I haven’t seen anyone, not that they have not tried to see me. I think that I have made it clear that I just want to be left alone. The noises in the house and the food that shows up at the door are the only indications I have that I am not alone. 

I have been lying on the bed for so long that the left side of my body has rocked itself to sleep. I hear the knocking on the door but I don’t get up. I give whoever it is enough time to leave the door and when I think I am safe I walk over and crack the door open. 

“Hello Daphne,” Justin says as he pushes past me, food tray held firmly in his hands. He walks over to the dresser and places the tray on top as he goes and sits down on the corner of my bed. He is staring at me, daring me to try and tell him to leave. I let out a puff of air and push the door closed. “Your mom let me in. She went out to run some errands. She said to tell you that she will not be home for a few hours.” He gets up and moves over to the food on the tray.

“She didn’t really give you anything exciting. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich, wow, what are you five?” Justin says. He turns back toward me and bends down by the bed. He flings his bag on the bed, I hadn’t seen it before, and zips open the front. He pulls out a crumpled paper bag and pushes it into my hands. “Go ahead and open it. I think you’ll like it more than what is on that tray.” I open the bag and there are two slices of pizza and some Dr. Pepper inside. I cannot help the smile that plays on my lips as I smell the pizza. “Yeah, I thought you might like it.”

We sit in silence for a half an hour, each one of us wondering what to say. I haven’t used my voice in what seems like forever. I haven’t wanted to talk to anyone, but this isn’t anyone… this is Justin. “I went with him,” I say softly. It comes from my lips in a whisper. Justin is watching me, giving me a chance to think, to breathe… to explode. “I went with him,” I say again. I want to cry, but all I feel is anger… bitterness… hatred… fear. I want to cry, but I can’t cry, all I can do… is scream. So that’s what I do. I scream. 

“Daphne,” he tries to say. 

“I walked out the door and I knew better. Something told me to stop and I walked out the door. I didn’t even tell anyone where I was going. He was acting so fucking sweet. Asshole… fucking asshole,” I yell. I scream it and I am almost sure that Justin is getting a little scared. I knock the food tray off of the dresser, not caring where the food lands. I turn around and toss my pillow off the bed, ripping at the sheets and the comforter, anything that is not going to fight me back. 

Justin is in the corner of the room, watching me lose myself. I stop in the middle of my tantrum and drop to the floor. I let my body fold in on itself and when I feel Justin slide his arms around me I wrap my arms around him and let the tears flow. They come out loud. They come out hard. They come out kicking and screaming… and I feel one step closer to normal. 

“It’s not your fault,” he tells me. 

“I know.”

“Daphne, who was it?” he asks me. I pull back and we sit in front of each other, legs crossed and knees touching, just like when we were little. We would sit like this for hours, telling each other our secrets and our dreams. Time moves on, we are not little anymore. He has Brian to tell his secrets to, but I don’t think he tells Brian a lot of things. 

I lock my brown eyes on his blue ones and I know that he knows. “It’s not important,” I tell him. “I don’t want to sit in a court room and have people know everything that happened. I don’t want to see the faces of the ones who think I am lying.” I stare at him and he smiles a little and nods as he reaches up to wipe a tear away from my face.

“It’s gonna take a whole box of tissue to clean you up,” he tells me as he pushes my hair back behind my ears. I laugh and rest my head in his chest. “You stink.”

“Fuck you,” I say as I wipe my nose with my hand. He kisses my head and lifts me up right as I finish the motion.

“You are so fucking nasty. Come on, you need to take a shower.” He gets up and helps me up, pushing me toward the bathroom when I am firmly on my feet. An hour later I am cleaner than I have been in a week. “You smell a lot better,” he tells me as he opens my bedroom window and lights a cigarette. 

“My mom is going to kill you if she smells that in here.” He walks over to me and grabs my hand before I can protest and drags me out my bedroom, down the stairs and out the backdoor. I hesitate slightly and he gives my hand a firm yank, pulling me all the way outside. We sit on the back porch, smoking. I am leaning on his shoulder and as he takes a deep pull from the cigarette I am tempted to ask him why it is so easy for him to help everyone else, but he can’t help himself. He beats me to it.

“I have seen three counselors. I hated them all,” he tells me as he blows smoke into the air. “I think Brian is getting to the end of his rope with me, hell, I am getting tired of myself.” I take the cigarette from him and pull the smoke into my lungs.

“What do you want to do Justin?” He looks over at me with a question in his eyes. “I mean, fuck everyone else. What do _you_ want to do?”

“I want…” he says and pauses as he takes a final pull off the cigarette and crushes it into the concrete of the porch. “I want to be able to breathe… and not feel like I am going to die.” He rolls the butt in between his fingers and stares off into the distance. “I have another appointment with another doctor tomorrow. I don’t think I am going to go,” he says. I bite down on my fingernail and look up at the blond hair that is grazing my face ever so often as the wind runs through it. 

“Justin… I think you should go. At least check it out,” I say and I can tell that he is not really considering anything. “If you go tomorrow… I’ll look into seeing someone too,” I tell him nervously. I really don’t want to see anyone, but, if my helping myself will push him to help himself, I’ll do it. 

“Daphne…”

“We have always done everything together, why stop now?” I reach up and slip my right hand into his left, noticing the fine scars that decorate his arm. We lace our fingers together and sit there in the atmosphere of silence. 

**

I pull my car into my parking space and get out. I walk up to the front doors of the brick building and pause to look at my name, blazing from its space on the steel door, ‘Dr. Marc Jacobs.’ I pull the steel door open and put the stopper on, repeating the motion for the door on the other side, propping them open. I place my keys in the pocket of my jeans and pluck a lollipop from the pocket of my leather jacket. I toss the lollipop in my mouth as I come face to face with my assistant, who is also my sister. “Hey,” I say as I take the lollipop out of my mouth. 

“Hey, you have a pretty easy day today,” she tells me as we keep walking. “You have one appointment scheduled. It is a Mr. Justin Taylor; he filled out all the preliminary paperwork and is scheduled to come in at four.” I listen to her as I go over to my desk and sit down, turning my computer on. She puts the file in front of me along with a cup of coffee. 

“Thanks. Why didn’t you open the door for me when I got here this morning? I know you heard me at the door,” I say with a smile. She smiles at me and looks around my spacious office. 

“You have a key. You are my brother, my _little_ brother, don’t get too excited.” She turns to leave and stops at the door, looking at me. “You may want to think about making this place look more like… umm, a real psychologist’s office,” she says. 

“I don’t want it to look like the same boring ass psychologist’s office you always see. Fuck all that shit,” I tell her as I start to check my emails. “I don’t have time for bullshit and games. If they want a psychologist with millions of plaques on the walls and degrees and shit then they can go somewhere else.”

“You have your degrees on the wall,” she says. I look up at her and smirk. 

I point to a space next to the expansive window that almost fills one entire wall of my office. “No, I have them in one space. It’s not the same,” I tell her with a smile. 

“Whatever you say,” she offers before leaving me alone.

**

“Do you want me to come with you to the appointment?” I ask. I am watching Justin without watching him. He is sitting on the sofa sketching quickly into his sketchbook. “Justin… JUSTIN!”

“Oh, huh?” He asks. His hand is moving over the sketchpad without thought or boundaries. He went to school today and has been drawing since he walked through the door. 

“Do you want me to go to your appointment with you?” I repeat. The pencil stops moving and he looks up at me. I can see that he is torn. He wants me to be there and at the same time he wants me so far away from him. 

“Can you just give me a ride and… wait around for me?” I nod my head and he moves to get ready to leave. I watch him move around getting ready and I cannot help but to feel a little bitter. I am so angry with him sometimes for coming into my life and making me care about him, and he did it so fast. So fast that I didn’t even see him coming. And when I did see him… I was already falling. “Brian,” he calls. I break out of my thoughts and follow him out of the loft, locking the door behind me. 

**

Brian stops the car in front of a brick building. It does not look like any doctor’s office I have seen before. It almost looks like… “Fuck, it almost looks just like Kinnetik,” Brian says as we walk through the doors. I walk over to the woman sitting at the desk and Brian walks around the lobby area.

“Hello, I’m Justin Taylor. I have an appointment,” I tell her. For a few seconds she looks at me and I feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. She gives me a look that says she doesn’t see what problems I could have. 

“Okay, just let me buzz the doctor.” She buzzes the doctor’s office and I hear a voice say ‘come in.’ “You can go on back, it’s the second door on the right,” she says with a smile and I think I may like her after all. Brian moves over to me as I walk away from her. 

“I’ll be here when you get out.” He presses his lips to mine and I feel my fingers grip his jacket. He places a hand on my back and applies just enough… pressure.

* * *

Thank you to my beta Carly, she puts up with all my craziness. Thank you to Carrie who helped me hash out the doctor. Thank you to Britt and Carrie who together managed to bug the SHIT out of me for this chapter. Thanks to all the girls for pressuring me.


	16. Rose Water

AN: I have to thank my beta Carly. I love you Carly, you fucking ROCK. I also have to thank Britt and Carrie for pressing me for this chapter because I was completely not moving with it at all. Thanks guys. Okay, seriously, Britt pressed. Carrie pushed me off the fucking cliff and threatened to rain down boulders on my bruised body.

* * *

The taste of blood is hard to forget. It is pressed into the brain. It is engraved on the tongue. I can always remember it. I don’t really think that I want to forget it. Blood is more than thick, it is… lasting. 

I sit on the sofa and clasp my hands together tightly. I am watching him and he is watching me. We are waiting, hoping, praying that the other will… cave. 

I know what he is going to say. He is going to want to know _exactly_ what I feel my problem is. I have no idea what _exactly_ my _problem_ is. He is going to want to know if I had a bad childhood. My childhood was fine. I was so fucking happy it’s sick. He is going to want to know if I was touched… molested… abused. No… well, I don’t think so. 

He is going to want to know all these things that I really don’t want to tell him and the only thing that runs through my mind is, ‘Oh my fucking God why am I here?’

I let out a heavy sigh, which is probably not the best thing to do in a doctor’s office. I like his office. I can breathe in his office. I can think in his office. I can almost… feel, in his office. 

I steady myself when I see him sit forward in his chair. I wait for the inevitable onslaught of questions. “Let’s play some pool,” he says as he stands up from his seat and walks across the office. Okay, I was not expecting that. He slides the door open and I have to give him credit for the design of the office. It’s nice. “Do you play?”

“Yeah,” I answer. I am damn near speechless. I get up and cautiously follow him into the adjoining room. He is already racking up the balls. Two cues are sitting on top of the pool table. I look around as I lazily brush my hand over the top of the table. The walls are white, but not quite. There are games, toys, books, anything and everything you could imagine filling the room and yet, it feels almost empty. 

“This doesn’t look like a regular doctor’s office.” It’s the first real thing I have said and I expect him to jump at the opportunity to talk to me. I expect him to almost piss at the fact that I am finally giving him the time of day. He doesn’t. He just looks around and nods his head before taking the rack off the balls and looking at me. 

“You can be solids, I’ll be stripes,” he says. We move around the pool table, each taking our turns. I am kicking his ass and after the first game and the first forty minutes I forget that he is a doctor. I forget that I am fucked up and he is supposed to fix me. I forget, because right now, right here, I am completely… normal. 

 

How can you be anything other than normal in a place where everyone is as equally fucked up? Maybe that’s why I can breathe the air in his office. It’s tainted air, and for me it’s pure.

“I think it’s fair to say that you kicked my ass,” he says to me. He walks over to a refrigerator and pulls out two bottles of water. I sit down on top of the pool table and drink the water that he offers me.

“Fair, I think it’s more than fair. I _did_ kick your ass,” I say. He laughs and nods his head. He adjusts the sleeve of his shirt and I finally take him all in. He is dressed like he is ready to go out and pick up a trick at any moment. He looks incredibly, relaxed. “You know, you don’t dress like most doctors. Most doctors wear slacks and shirts and ties,” I inform him as I take another drink. My eyes catch on my newest batch of scars and I mentally try to wipe the image away as I let my arm go back to resting on my leg. He sees me looking, he stays silent. 

He looks down at his clothes and smiles. “I like to be comfortable. So, how did you get so good at pool?” He walks over to the sitting area in the room and sits down in one of the oversized chairs. I stay where I am. He takes a drink of his water and waits for my answer.

“Brian plays a lot,” I say as I pull at the paper that is wrapped around the plastic water bottle in my hand, the label, proudly displaying for the consumer the contents of the bottle. I wonder briefly what my label would be. Would it read ‘Gay,’ ‘Young,’ ‘Trapped,’ ‘Lonely,’ ‘Loved?’ I wonder. Would it simply say ‘Justin?’

“Brian is your boyfriend?” He asks, snapping me out of my silent thoughts. I smirk as I think about his question. I can say anything. I can say that Brian is not really the ‘boyfriend’ type. I can say that maybe he should ask Brian that question. I can say that we have not known each other for a long time but really, what the fuck does the duration of a relationship have to do with the defining name for the other person? He either is… or he isn’t. It’s cut and it’s dry. Except I am hesitating, so I figure fuck it, I’ll say exactly what I want to say.

“Yeah.” He nods and I can almost see him filing my extended pause away in some fucking folder in his head. When the time is right I can imagine him double clicking right on my face. Actually, it’s kind of funny. I would laugh if I was not as nervous as shit. 

I get up off of the pool table and walk toward the sitting area, toward him, closing the gap between us. “When I first saw him I felt like I was falling,” I tell him and I don’t know why. I just had to say it. 

“What happened that made you feel like you were falling?” He asks. I think he wants to hear that I looked up and saw hazel eyes and that was it, my heart was gone. I think he wants to hear that my heart sped up and my soul shifted. I think he wants to hear that the world stopped spinning. It did. All of that happened, and all of it felt good, but it’s not what I mean. I look at him as I walk past him and over to the window. 

“I knew he would catch me,” I say. He doesn’t understand what I mean. I don’t have to turn around and look at him to know that he doesn’t get it. I laugh a little as I think of the expression that is more than likely playing across his face. I laugh, but I don’t bother to explain it to him. “Where did you learn to play pool?” I don’t want to talk about Brian right now.

I hear the water bottle move before he answers. “My dad taught me. We used to play together all the time,” he says. The glass of the window is clean, hopelessly clean and I wonder briefly if some deranged obsessive-compulsive patient is responsible. A picture of the sparkling glass slicing through my skin flashes through my brain and I feel my blood cool and then boil with need and want. 

“Why don’t you play together anymore? Did you like to paint or draw and he thought it was a little too… gay?” That slipped out and I would give anything to take it back, reel it all back in. He just double clicked on my file, another entry.

“He died. We played every Saturday until the week before he died.” Fuck, now I feel bad. Not bad that his dad died, but bad that I am almost envious. 

“Sorry, about your dad I mean,” I say as I turn to face him. He is not crying or teary eyed and I am grateful for it. “When did he die?”

“Two years ago. He had a heart attack, it was very sudden,” he says as he finishes off his water. I nod and turn back to the window. The sun is bright, warming my skin through the glass. I look out the window and across the street. We are very close to the museum that Lindsay works at. I can see the front doors from here. I love that museum. I place my palms on the glass, ruining the perfection of it with guiltless abandon. 

I exhale as my hands take strength from the translucent partition that was once silica sand and that is now mixed with other materials to form a fragile strength. Glass is strong enough to be used as a support around and within a structure and fragile enough to be easily broken. I am glass. Brian told me once that he loved my hands and as I look at them I wonder why. 

I am looking out at the parking lot. The sun is pressing down on the cars below, reflecting in their windows and shining back up at me. I wonder for the better part of two seconds what my body would look like if it was impacted on the roof of one of the cars. Would it diminish their value? Hmm, I wonder. 

“Is your father still alive?” I almost jump out of my skin at the sound of his voice. I forgot he was here. I let go of the window and sit down in the chair that is sitting across from him. He is sitting back, relaxing. His hand with the water bottle is propped up next to his head and he is chewing a piece of gum. He did not have gum before, where did he get gum? I want some gum. 

I glance out of the window and I see Brian outside, at the corner of the street. He crosses with the light and tosses his cigarette out as he reaches the stairs of the museum. I was wondering how long he could wait and I smile. “Justin,” he calls to snap me back into the room. 

“Sorry, you said something?” He repeats the question and looks at me. Hours have passed and I suddenly notice how hot it is in his here. It’s not really hot in here but damn that’s how it feels with all eyes on me. I sit back in the seat and fold my arms over my chest. 

“Yeah, he is still alive.” Drop it. I don’t want to talk about him. He may be alive but he is dead to me.

“Do you talk to him?” he asks. I bite my lip and release it.

“No,” I say, short and sweet.

“Do you ever want to?” He asks. I don’t answer and the time ticks away. I want to answer, I do, but I really don’t know what to say. 

The pain of loving someone so much that you hate is… indescribable. I don’t try to mask the tears that start to fall out of my eyes as I look at him. I don’t know why the tears are there. I am not sad. I am not sorry. I am not angry. I just am... and maybe that’s reason enough. Double click.

**

Living with someone is scary. I think it helps that I never _asked_ him to move in with me. One day, he just never went home. Helping them want to live is hard. I wonder if I am strong enough. I wonder if too much time has passed and I am too far into my life to try and alter it for someone that, realistically, I just met. I wonder. Justin is worth it. Am I?

“You look very familiar,” the woman at the desk says. I look over at her with a raised eyebrow. She is a pretty woman, and she looks just like the doctor. She can see the thought running through my mind and smiles brightly. “He’s my little brother.” I nod my head to show my understanding. She gets up from the desk to come and talk to me. 

“You look just like him,” I say. She sits next to me on the leather couch. I noticed the leather. It is rich. It is durable. It is real. It is damn expensive. I unconsciously move my hand over it. 

“Yeah, it’s a blessing and a curse,” she says smiling. “I think I have seen you at one of those advertising conferences.” She is so bubbly but subdued. I can stand her. I sit back on the couch. She pulls her legs in under her. “What do you do? That is, if you don’t mind me asking,” she says.

“I’m in advertising,” I tell her. I expect her to ask agonizingly long and pointless questions that I really have no interest in answering. Questions about commercials and finding people to act in them, but instead she thinks for a minute and then looks back at me.

“Interesting,” she says. People always say that, and usually it’s because they really could care less what the fuck you do. They are just trying to be polite. Fuck polite. “Do you like to use size twenty font or smaller when you are setting up your panels? Are you really hands on or do you just let the various departments deal with their end and leave them to their work?” Fuck… ass, I was _not_ expecting that and the look on my face says just that. She smiles at me and pushes some of her hair behind her ear. It’s long and jet black. 

“My girlfriend is in advertising, she owns a really small agency. She deals more with small companies or like mom and pop stores,” she says. I can breathe again. I thought I was about to be dealing with direct competition. I trace the inside of my mouth with my tongue as she talks. God I want a cigarette. “Maybe you have heard of her company, Majestic Images.” I have heard of her company. I have done advertising for some of her clients that have moved on to bigger markets. She is actually very good.

“Yeah, actually I have, she does very good work.” She seems to almost burst with pride. She must really love her girlfriend. I wonder how she knew. How she first knew that she loved this other person. Did she just wake up one day and feel it, or did it creep up on her and choke her? I wonder, and then I wonder if it even matters. Love… is relative.

“Wow, you have seen some of her work? That’s great. So, what exactly do you do in advertising?” She seems to really want to know. I sneak a glance at my watch and more than an hour has passed. I have been sitting here waiting for Justin to come storming out of the office and out the front door, pissed, frustrated and in tears. I have to give the doc credit. It’s an accomplishment all by itself. He is still in there. 

“I own my own advertising agency too, Kinnetik Inc.” She is practically down my throat as she lunges forward and smacks me in the chest. She curls back quickly as she realizes that she just dropped her business persona. 

“Sorry,” she says. I give a smirk to let her know that it’s fine. Fuck, that hurt. She hits almost as hard as Lindsay. “Holy shit, you are Brian Kinney.” She is so excited. 

“Yeah,” I say. I know that I am good at what I do but I did not know that I had a fan club, one that was not going to suck my dick. Okay, maybe I did know I had a fan club in the advertising world, but nobody likes a smartass. I can be modest. I can. Holy shit, she is not wearing any underwear. I think I just went blind. Fuck, I looked again. 

“Wait until I tell her I met you today.” She is so amazed. “I have seen you a few times at Woody’s and around Liberty Avenue,” she says and now I put it together. She is at work right now, but at night she is wild. I like her. “Do you have a card or something? I would really like to have one, if that’s okay.” I reach into my jean pocket and pull out my card holder, handing her one. She looks at the card and reads it out loud before palming it and standing up. “I better get back to work. It was very nice finally getting to actually meet you.” Her business façade is back in place. 

“Same here, and judging from how long he has been back there I assume we may be seeing a lot of each other.” Why am I talking to her? She is the only one here and I am bored. Maybe that’s why. Or maybe it’s because she doesn’t know me. She has no reason to kiss my ass, and I like that. I like it a lot. I feel the same way with Justin. Maybe that is love. I open my mouth slightly and take a deep breath. 

The desire for a cigarette comes back hard and fast. “Can you tell Justin that I went outside for a smoke?” I ask the woman. 

“Yeah,” she answers. I walk away from her desk and out of the door, realizing that I never asked her name. Oh well. The sun hits me and I feel warm. The air is so rich I almost choke. There are not too many people mulling around here today. It strikes me as weird. 

I light my cigarette and take a deep pull, walking a little ways down the sidewalk. When I get to the end of the street I look up and lock eyes with Lindsay’s museum. I stand there waiting for the lights to change so that I can cross the street. 

As I get closer I remember when I met Justin here. When I set eyes on him the bottom dropped out of my world. It was almost like I was suspended and waiting. For what, I really don’t know, and on some level… I don’t care. I feel like I have known him for years. 

I wonder if he is my biggest nightmare. He is challenging. His whole situation is challenging… tiring. I could pretend like love will pull us through anything, but I am not going to bullshit myself. I know we are playing with fire.

Every time he smiles at me I have to gauge if it is real. Every time he laughs I wonder if tears will follow. If he is quiet I wonder if he is too quiet. Every time he goes into the bathroom I wonder if he will come back out or if I will have to go in and peel him up off the floor. I have done it before. 

We exist in our own private world, he falls apart and I pick him up and put him back together. Is he worth it? My heart tells me ‘yes.’ He has to be worth it. I know he is worth it, but am I strong enough? 

Who is going to catch me if I start to fall, Justin?

I flick my cigarette off to the side as I climb the steps of the museum. The tiles are shined to perfection and for a moment I hesitate. I don’t know why. I shake off the feeling that passed inside of me. I walk through the museum, expensive boots on expensive floors. 

I knock on the door to Lindsay’s office and walk in. “You could have waited until I said you could come in,” she tells me. I sit down in one of her chairs and kick my leg up on her desk.

“What’s up?” I ask her. She looks at me strangely before answering.

“Nothing, just going over some preliminaries for an exhibit that is opening up in two weeks, I think we are going to have a pretty big turn out.” She keeps talking and I block her out. I notice that on her desk there is a picture of her, Melanie and Gus, all together and smiling. 

As I continue to look I notice that she has pictures of all the family, everyone. But they are not on the desk. They are behind her, on a little table. But Melanie and Gus are on the desk, in front of her and smiling, and then… and then I see me. 

I am holding Gus. I realize that I have never seen this picture before, never. I am not looking at the camera, I am looking at my son and I look completely and hopelessly… lost in him. Entangled. Trapped. Happy. I love my son more than I ever thought that I would. 

I love him despite his faults. I love him regardless of the bad things he may do. I love him for _all_ of his good and his bad. I love him with something more than my heart and deeper than my soul. I would put off dying for as long as I could to spend one more day with him… to talk to him… to smile with him.

How do I know that that is love? I don’t, but I do know that I would do it effortlessly, without a moment of hesitation… and gladly. I would do all these things for him and I suddenly realize. I am thinking of Justin. I could say that he completes me, but that’s too trite… too small. 

He doesn’t complete me. I don’t need to be made complete. I was born that way. Justin does more than complete me… he enhances me. He makes every part of me better, and I like the feeling. 

Does that mean that it’s love? I don’t know. Does that mean that we will last for years and years to come? I don’t know. Does it mean that we are meant to be together? I don’t know. But damn, it sure feels good.


	17. Rose Water

Thank you to my beta Carly. Thank you so much.

* * *

Pure ecstasy… is blinding. Pure ecstasy… is pain. Pure ecstasy… is pleasure. I want to die wrapped in it. I want to live inside it forever. It comes in many forms, and there are too many to name, too many to experience. Ecstasy is on the edge of the unattainable. It is so far out of reach. It is closer than a breath of air. Not everyone can grasp it. Not everyone who manages to grasp it manages to hold on, but if you can… if you do. Close your eyes… and let go. Exhale. 

Clothes are on the floor. Clothes are on the sofa. Clothes are on the steps. Clothes are on the bed. Clothes are on… the beam? Wow, we must have got a little too excited. My back is crushing into the duvet, clinging to it. It is almost a part of me. I hear nothing, nothing at all. 

Justin has a need for control. I let him have it. I let him release his feelings, his questions and his answers onto me. He trails his tongue down my body and I grasp his hair, pulling slightly to increase his pleasure and numb his pain. He takes me into his mouth and I bite my bottom lip. Flesh against bone. 

I lose myself in the sensations. He releases me from his heated confines and I hold back the moan that threatens to escape from between my lips. 

He follows the trail of cooling saliva that led him to my cock. He follows it back up my body until his lips rest against mine. His hands are grasping at my shoulders. My hands are trailing up and down his back. Our tongues are searching, prodding, pushing… pressing into each other. 

He sits up, legs on either side of me. He says nothing. I say nothing. He smiles and moves back a little. Our pulsating muscles are resting on top of each other, wanting release. 

I want him to grab the condom and the lube. I want him to slide the condom on me and let me fuck him. I want to release inside of him. He has other plans. He needs more. He wants more. He leans forward and kisses me, soft and deep. He sits back up and places his fingertips on my shoulders, firmly smoothing them down my arm with just the right amount of pressure. My nerves twist and coil as he moves along, teasing. 

He repeats the action and my cock responds, straining to touch his welcoming hole. He moves back further. He trails his fingertips down my torso, adding nails to heighten the journey, further the experience. I shiver as he lets his hands reach behind him and continue the motion over my thighs, down my legs, pass my calves and back up again.

He lifts up completely, moving off of my body and nudging me. He wants me to roll over and still we say nothing. I comply. 

He reaches over to the nightstand, opening the drawer. A shudder runs through me as I feel a cool, thick liquid hit my skin. I feel his hands, warm and welcoming, running along my back, coaxing my muscles and begging them to relax. I can smell the skin-warmed oil as it coats my body. It smells like fruit, and then I feel his tongue.

He is sucking on the back of my neck and I can feel my pulse respond. My heart is racing. He kisses down my back, stopping to place a kiss on every vertebra. I moan, soft and low. I am leaking steadily, soaking the sheets. He knows it, and he takes his time. He shifts his body again, rising up and giving me enough room to turn over. 

I flip onto my back and hiss as our cocks bump into each other again. He smiles down at me as he slowly starts to move his hips. A rush of heat flushes through my body as I feel his pubic hair graze my leg.

I move my hands up his thighs, planting them on his hips, stilling his movements. I hold him there, suspended in motion and wanting. He is breathing hard and deep… panting… waiting. So am I. 

I breathe deeply, pushing my orgasm back down. I watch him. He is doing the same. He is desperately trying to calm himself. He is trying to steady his nerves... bury his anticipation. So am I. 

I hold his hips and turn us over in… one… fluid… motion. 

I bring my lips to the flesh of his neck, bypassing his parted lips. I want to explore inside his mouth. I want to taste his tongue. I want to press our lips together until they bruise… but I hold back. I suck on his vein, crushing his pulse and claiming it as mine. I stay there for what seems like hours, devouring the delicate skin.

I lick over the heated surface, cooling it slightly before heating it again. I move down his neck, licking and kissing. He is moving beneath me, arching up to places unknown. He is completely reckless. It’s sexy. I pause, and he comes down from his high long enough to wonder why. I smile against his chest as a small whimper escapes from between his panting lips. 

I work my way down his body, licking the pre-cum that is pooling at the head of his throbbing cock. He is hard and ready. I let the sweet taste coat my throat and burn into the tissue inside of my mouth. It’s like nectar, but sweeter. I move down to the inside of his thigh. The flesh is more heated here, porcelain white and in need of attention. I lick… I kiss… I touch… I blow air on the seemingly smooth skin. Justin is swimming, drowning. 

I worm back up his body, pinching his erect nipples and biting at his skin. He tastes like fruit, the residual effects of the massage oil. It transferred onto him. I capture his lips in mine, finally giving into the desire to join my lips with his. The kiss is infinite. I bite down on his bottom lip and he bucks into me. I feel his hands press into my back. 

I move my hand up and down his body. The beat of his heart is melting into me. I trace his lips with my fingers as I look at him. He opens his mouth and takes my fingers in, sucking rhythmically. He gets them wet. He coats them. He pants. I want him. 

My cock is throbbing as he sucks. I remove my fingers and trail them over his body, moving his legs further apart as I place my finger at his waiting hole. He shivers. I circle his hole before pressing forward and breaking through his barrier. 

He wants to move but I hold him still. I feel his insides, slowly moving my finger in and out as I watch the colors of his eyes change from crystal blue to heated cobalt. 

I add another finger and he groans deeply. I reach over and grab the lube and a condom. I place them on the bed next to his head and add another finger. I release my hold on his hips and let him move. I let him wiggle. I let him buck up and thrust into me as I move my fingers inside of him, and then… I stop. He is arched up off of the bed and I am smiling. His eyes are closed and his bottom lip is rolled into his mouth, held in place by his teeth. 

I reach for the condom and the lube and he turns his head to suck on my arm. He is sucking on my arm and I let him. My eyes shift from the lube and condom in my hand to his lips as he works on my skin. I can see the bruise already forming there. I move my arm, reluctantly. His eyes lock on mine. He smiles. 

I open the condom and slowly roll it onto my leaking cock. I take the lube and squeeze it onto his hole. Justin moves a little from the cold before settling into the duvet again. I squeeze some of the lube onto my cock and press it closed. I grab his legs, pulling him closer to me. His legs are resting in the bends of my arms and I spread him wider. He is breathing hard. So am I. I place my dick at his quaking hole… and press forward. 

He gasps and I stop, giving him just a moment. He needs to relax. I need to wait. He lets out a rush of air and wills his body to release. I feel myself slide forward and before I know it I am flat against him. I move back out and pause before pressing back into him again. We are timeless… limitless. 

He is hot and tight around me, holding me firmly inside of him. We move together, dueling for dominance in the race to release. I move my arms and let his legs go. I can feel the sweat pooling on my skin, I can see it on his. I lean down and take his nipple into my mouth, sucking deeply as I thrust. His hands move around to the backs of my thighs, pulling me closer and urging me deeper. 

My heart is racing. I fall on top of him, pacing myself and backing up from the ledge of the building. We steady our breaths together. He brings a sex shaken hand to my shoulder, kisses my lips and pushes me over. I settle into the sheets. He straddles my legs and licks my jaw. My condom encased dick is squealing for release. 

He kisses along my jaw, down to my ear, taking the lobe into his mouth. He lifts up and carefully lines himself up with my cock. I hold him steady, one hand on his hip and one on my cock as he sinks down onto the hard shaft. 

The breath he releases in my ear is warm and stunted. He sounds beautiful. He bites down hard as I push up and into him. My hands fly up and grasp his arms to help level out the pain. He lets my lobe go and sits up, wincing from pain and pleasure. I hold onto him. He steadies himself and starts to move. He rises up and down on my pulsating pole, milking my orgasm from deep within the confines of my body.

I roll my top lip into my mouth and bite down. He is moving, fast… hard and steady. I can feel him gripping and releasing me. He slows down as I thrust to meet his movements. His cock leaks pre-cum onto me. It escapes from his slit and mingles with my pubic hair. I run my fingers through it and press them to his lips. He opens his mouth and I slide my fingers inside. He licks down my fingers and through my palm, coating my hand in his saliva. 

I move my hand from his mouth and encase his dick. It is warm. I slide my hand along the length. He pushes down harder. He is more determined with every thrust. I feel the vein in his dick pulsate and then erupt, coating my chest in his seed. He leans down, licks a trail through his fresh cum, and takes my lips into his. I can taste his seed on my lips, in my mouth, over my tongue and down my throat. 

Eternities later I follow. He leans forward and bites down on my bottom lip as I come. He bites and sucks, working the soft skin between his lips and tongue. I kiss him. He kisses me. He pants into my mouth as his heart tries to slow down. He whimpers into me as I press my ass into the mattress and gently pull on his legs, raising him up and allowing myself to slip free. 

He moves off of me and rests his head on his pillow. I hold the condom and slide it off, tying it quickly and tossing it onto the floor. He sighs and I reach over to grab a cigarette off the nightstand. I light it and drop the lighter onto the bed. I feel Justin’s fingers on my arms. I take a deep drag and blow the smoke out as I turn to look at him. He smiles at me and I kiss his temple. There are no words.

I look back at the ceiling and in no time I hear the soft breathing that is Justin sleeping. I put my cigarette out and leave the unfinished butt in the ashtray. I turn my body toward his. He is half on his stomach and half on his side, slicked in cum and sweat. I trace my fingers down his body, from his face to his thighs. 

The scars from his cuts seem to glow in the post euphoric haze. They stand out like statues, monuments to times gone by. They are erect and strong. The irony is that the event has not passed. The memorials are premature. The battle is not over yet. Justin moves a little and I get up out of the bed and head to the bathroom. 

His toothbrush is on the counter. His soap is in the shower. His clothes are in the hamper. His presence in my life is so… palpable. 

I grab my toothbrush and brush my teeth before stepping into the shower and letting the heated water wash over me. I wash my hair. I rinse his smell from my body. I rinse his smell from my hair. I rinse his smell from my cock. I rinse his smell from my hands, my feet, everything. I can’t erase his smell from my memory. I don’t want to. 

I turn the water off and step from the shower, walking into the bedroom to get dressed. I put on my jeans, one leg and then the other. I grab a black snap-up shirt and pull it on, snapping it up as I walk to the kitchen. I open the refrigerator and reach for a bottle of water. I turn the cap and take a long drink, swallowing the liquid. 

Justin stirs in the bedroom and I hear him moan. It is a well-fucked, satisfied moan. I smirk. He gets up from the bed and walks to the bathroom. I hear the shower turn on and finish the rest of my water. He emerges a few minutes later, a pitch black towel snuggled firmly on his waist. 

He gets dressed, jeans and a white shirt. I focus my attention on the campaign I am working on. I am at the computer. “Hey,” he says as he comes out of the bedroom and walks into the kitchen, searching for food. 

“Hey.” He turns to me after his futile search. He walks over to the edge of the counter and taps on the top.

“I’m hungry.” I mentally roll my eyes. “Let’s go get something to eat,” he says with a smile. He walks closer, stopping at the edge of my desk. 

“You go, I’m working.” He walks over to the door and turns around, walking over to the sofa and sitting down. He picks up his sketchpad and starts to draw. I can be the biggest mother-fucking asshole on the face of the planet and refuse to move, but I decide not to be. I save my work and shut the computer down. “Okay, let’s go,” I say. 

He jumps up and moves over to the door. Off to the diner we go.

“There is no way in this world that you are going to eat all that,” I say to Justin as we slide into a booth. He is on one side and I am on the other. 

“Yeah I will. I worked up quite an appetite,” he says with a small laugh as he eats his food. I look down at his plate and frown before taking a sip of my coffee. We have skirted around all conversation about the doctor for a week. I know he doesn’t want to talk about it, I know that, but he needs to. 

“Justin,” I start. He keeps eating as he looks at me and I can tell. I can feel, that he knows I am about to shift his mood.

“Yeah,” he answers as he waits for the other shoe to drop. 

“Are you going to go back and see Dr. Jacobs?” He looks at me, the question running through his brain. He stares at me, past me, through me. I can tell by the look in his eyes, he wants to disappear. He is taking too long to answer. “Well?”

“I don’t know, maybe,” he offers. He puts the straw that is staked through his soda into his mouth. I open my mouth to say something but before I can I hear the bell above the diner door ring. I don’t look, I don’t need to. 

“Hey Brian, haven’t seen you in a while,” Michael says. “Hi Justin,” he adds. They have never been the best of the friends. I don’t expect them to be. They are trying to share me and neither one wants to give an inch. 

**

Michael is here. We tolerate each other. Any other word to describe our relationship would be a lie. He sits down in the booth, next to Brian. After my initial response to his greeting I don’t say anything. “Where have you guys been?” He asks. Brian answers him and he seems satisfied with what he hears. He is looking at me.

“Did you say something?” I ask. He looks at me a little weird and repeats himself. He wants to know how my classes are going. Fuck my classes. He wants to know when I am graduating. “My classes are going pretty good. I graduate in about three weeks.” He nods his head.

“That’s great, are you excited?” No, not really. I haven’t really thought about it. I go to class in a daze. I don’t really pay attention to all that. I am terrified of thinking of the vast expanse of time that stretches beyond the confines of high school. Terrified… and so fucking… ready. 

I am supposed to be happy about graduating. I am supposed to look forward to it. I do look forward to it, well, I do and I don’t. I push myself through my thoughts and back into the conversation. “Do you want to come with us to Babylon? I am meeting the guys over there,” Michael says. Brian looks at me. If you ask him he will deny that he is asking me, silently, if I want to go. I throw the ball back in his court. Brian reads my silent offer for him to choose.

“Yeah, let’s go,” Brian says. Michael is so happy he almost chokes. He gets out of the booth quickly and Brian follows.

The men are everywhere. They populate every corner. They pulsate with the beat of the music. They are sweating. They are moving. They are heated… ready… and waiting. They are meat to be consumed, and right now, I am one of the cattle. 

“Hey,” the guys say as we walk up to the bar. They are all here, everyone. Brian leans against the bar and orders two shots, turning to hand one to me. He downs his and runs his hand down my chest as I trickle the burning liquid down my throat. The guys don’t see. They are not paying attention to us. 

Brian steps up to me, pressing his lips to my ear. “Come on sunshine, let’s dance,” he says. He takes the glass from my hand and puts it on the bar along with his. He walks out onto the dance floor, trailing me behind him. We are in the center of the room, the center of the world. He props his arms on top of my shoulders and we begin to move. 

Sixty minutes later and I am still on the dance floor. Sixty minutes later and I am soaked in sweat, nearly dehydrated, but still moving. Brian is long gone, abandoning me on the dance floor for the sanctuary of the backroom. I push it out of my mind. 

I don’t know the lyrics to the music. I don’t even know if there are any. Its okay, I don’t need them. I can feel the music inside of me, or maybe it’s the beating of my own heart. I am alone, all alone. Vertical sex. 

“Hey, let’s get out of here,” Brian says as he creeps up behind me. He is back from his romp in the backroom. I am supposed to pretend that it does not bother me. It does. He moves around my body until he is facing me. “How much have you had to drink?” He asks. He thinks I am drunk. I am. I stayed here on the dance floor, blending with the music. Men bought me drinks and I drank them, dismissing the giver at once. 

“Not that much,” I say. My words are slurred. My thoughts are blurry.

“You shouldn’t except drinks from strangers,” he tells me. Yeah, well, you shouldn’t fuck strangers in the backroom of a club when you have a willing party at home. He snakes his arm around my waist and pulls me toward the exit. 

He stops at the bar to say something to the guys. I say something. What am I talking about? We move away from them and when the cold air hits my face my heart speeds up.

Brian slides the loft door open with one hand, holding half of my weight with the other. He slides it close behind us and enters the security code. We move as one, up to the bedroom. 

He pushes me down onto the bed and I feel my clothes leave my body. He doesn’t lie down right away. He moves around the loft. I hear the toilet flush. I hear the water run. I am in a state of detached consciousness. I see him as he falls into bed, covering himself with the duvet and falling asleep. He does not try to touch me. I fall asleep. 

My head is pounding. I get up and move as quickly as I can to the bathroom, emptying the contents of my stomach into the toilet. I brush my teeth and wash my face before coming out of the bathroom and walking over to the kitchen counter. There are two tablets and a glass of water on the counter waiting for me. “Thanks,” I say. 

“You really shouldn’t take drinks from people you don’t know,” he tells me. The phrase sounds so familiar. Did he say that to me last night?

“I know,” I say as I put the tablets in my mouth and swallow all the water that he poured for me. Brian gets up and walks over to the counter. He leans against the stove and tosses some envelopes at me. I look down and the seals of the three schools that I applied to months ago are staring up and me. Brian takes a drink from his coffee cup and waits.

I pick up the envelopes and my eyes settle on the Dartmouth one first, my father’s choice. My eyes travel over to the envelope from The Pittsburgh Institute of Fine Arts, my choice. Finally, I look at the letter from Carnegie Mellon University, my backup plan. “You gonna stand there and stare or you gonna open them?” Brian asks. 

He moves back over to the dining room table. He has panels and spread outs of his latest campaign littered across the surface. I stay where I am at the counter. “I don’t know. If I open them, it makes it real.” I grab the three envelopes and move over to the other side of the table sitting across from him. I reach down to the floor, grab my bag and stuff the letters inside. “I’ll open them later. What are you working on?” 

“The Titus Motor Sports campaign, they have a brake pad that the company is pushing out onto the market and they want a campaign to highlight it, but at the same time they want to draw more attention to their other products.” I listen to everything, happy to help and not have to think about any of my bullshit. 

I sit with him and help him smooth out the rough edges. “I used to do this in art club,” I say. I keep my hands moving, helping him arrange a panel. I grab the logo for the company and try it out at different places on the panel. 

“Why’d you stop?” He asks as he watches me work. I have pushed him to the side and taken over. My natural ability for art and design is in full gear and my brain is pooling with thoughts of what to do with the board. 

I shrug my shoulders and let out a huff. “My dad didn’t like the art club. He said it was too ‘gay’,” I tell him, throwing my hands into the air and making quotation marks around the word. They should really educate people about the loose tongue caused by too much alcohol consumption. “He confronted me in the kitchen one morning. Actually, it was the same morning when I first met you.”

“Is that what happened to your face?” He asks. I pause as I listen to the lift outside the loft creak and moan with its movements. 

“You remember that?” 

“How could I forget?” He asks rhetorically. I guess you would not be able to forget someone covered in bandages with a bruise on their face and a busted lip. “You looked so…. Yeah, I remember.” I smile. 

“Well, he had my sketchbooks. They were filled with naked men and shit. He insisted that the art club was to blame, and he got pissed when I told him that I wasn’t going to quit. Let’s just say he destroyed the kitchen and got a few good hits in on me too.”

“Fuck, just because you wanted to draw?” I laugh to myself and glance at him before starting to manipulate the panel again.

“I knew.” He waits for me to clarify. I put the paper in my hand down and look at him. “I knew about his lady on the side. I knew, but I didn’t tell my mother.” Brian just nods his head. “I told him though. When he hit me the second time I blurted it out, loud and clear. You should have seen him. He was so pissed. That’s when he really got angry,” I say. 

My mind drifts back to that day, that time. I shake it off and cover it back up, at least for now. “That’s when I started staying over here all the time. I didn’t want to see him,” I say.

“Do you think he knows you’re gay?” Brian asks. 

“I think he knows it, somewhere deep down. My mom says I should have dinner at the house sometime. Come by and see Molly. Call my dad,” I say. 

“Uh-huh, and do you _want_ to see your dad?” Brian asks as he gets up and pours himself a drink. He searches in the kitchen drawer, looking for his new pack of cigarettes. 

“They’re in the drawer on your left, and I don’t know. I hate him so much and then I hear this voice inside of me that screams out to love him. I don’t know.”

“Yeah well, if he can’t accept you the way that you are… I say fuck him.” Brian places the drink to his lips and I digest what he said. I want to say fuck him. I want to. The words just won’t seem to leave my mouth. 

My cell phone lights up across the room and starts to vibrate. I get up to answer it and my brain registers the name slightly after my finger presses the call button. Damn my trigger finger. “Hey mom,” I answer.

Brian lets out a grunt and returns to his work. “Hello Justin,” she says. I see we are going to act like sugar and spice. Everything’s nice. “I was wondering if you wanted to come over for dinner. Your sister is going to be at your dad’s. It would just be you and me. We can talk,” she says. I know what she wants to talk about. Brian.

I look over at Brian and cover the phone. “She wants me to come to dinner,” I say. He gives me a look that says, ‘what the fuck are you looking at me for?’ I uncover the phone and answer her with much apprehension. “Yeah, I’ll come to dinner.” She tells me the time and I press end.

Dinner with someone you haven’t spent a lot of time with can be an eye-opening experience. It can make you laugh. It can make you cry. It can change the course of your life or make you wish you were dead. It can be the single most depressing event of your life. Pass the bread.

“I have missed you Justin,” she says after she hugs me and ushers me into the house. I walk in and sit down on the sofa. “How is… umm, Brian?” She asks. She asks to be polite. She doesn’t really want to know. 

“He’s fine. I told him that you called back while he was in the bathroom and invited him. He really wanted to come but he is getting ready for a presentation,” I tell her. He made it quite clear that the last thing he wanted to do was go to dinner at my mother’s house. 

“Have you heard from Dartmouth?” She doesn’t know about the other schools. We move into the kitchen and sit at the table. She made spaghetti, my favorite. The minutes tick by, changing to hours. Half the night is gone. 

I sit next to her on the sofa, talking about nothing. It’s almost like old times again… and then the illusion is shattered. The front door opens and I stare into eyes that are so much like my own. “Justin,” he says. That’s all the greeting I get.

“Craig,” I answer back. If he wants to play the name game… so will I. He is not pleased with my nerve to use his first name. That… makes me happy. 

The parental relationship is special. It is unique. No matter what they do, you find yourself seeking their approval… their love. You tell yourself that you don’t care. You tell yourself that you are strong enough to make it on your own. It’s all a lie. 

“What are you doing here?” He asks. He is standing in the entrance to the living room. I get up and go to stand in front of him. Never show your fear. I am terrified. 

“Having dinner with mom, _she_ … still wants to see me.”

“I never said that I didn’t want to see you.”

“You sure as hell acted like it.”

“Watch your mouth.” Now he wants to act so fucking paternal. It’s enough to make me almost obey him. Fuck that. Molly comes in the house, her bag in her hand. My mom didn’t say that she was coming home today. Or maybe I just assumed that she stayed with him longer. 

“Justin, wow, you haven’t been here in forever. I missed you,” she says as she drops her bag and wraps her arms around me. I hug her back. This is genuine happiness. 

“I’ve been busy,” I tell her. She is talking a mile a minute. I can barely keep up, and then she breaks the sound barrier. 

“Where’s your boyfriend? Mom said that you have a boyfriend not a girlfriend like most boys. Is he cute? I like boys too. Is he here?” She asks. The questions are rapid fire. I am looking at my father. He obviously does not ask anything about me. All of this is news to him. He probably didn’t even ask himself where I was living if I wasn’t living at home. 

“What the fuck is she talking about?” He asks. Molly looks up at me and she knows, she knows. She just fucked up. I smile down at her. 

I look him in the eyes and I can feel my mother move from her spot in the living room. She comes closer and waits. “I have a boyfriend.”

“What do you mean you have a boyfriend?” 

“I’m gay. I have a boyfriend. I stay at his place,” I say, laying out all my laundry. I glance down at his hands. They ball into fists and release. 

“Who is this kid? What’s his name?” He moves forward again. I move a fraction of an inch back. 

“He’s not a kid, he’s almost thirty,” I tell him. He laughs. He actually laughs. He doesn’t want to believe it. He shakes his head.

“You’re lying. You’re not a fag, you’re just… confused,” he rationalizes. My mouth opens before my brain engages.

“I’m not confused. When I have a warm dick inside me my….” He hits me before I can finish. I should have been ready for it. I can see him shouting but I don’t hear him. He turns to my mom and directs his shouts to her. I see her gesture to me but all I hear is ringing in my ears. 

I don’t wait for anything else from them. I grab my bag off the floor by the bottom of the stairs. I kiss Molly and walk out the door.

I walk and I walk and I walk. The side of my face is burning and throbbing and I walk. I look up and see the bright lights of the diner. I have come so far so fast. I open the front door and walk in, the bell signaling my presence. I look around and see Debbie in the corner serving a customer. I try to move past her but she sees me. “Sunshine, what are doing here so late?” Is it late? I don’t know the time. 

“Umm, I just wanted to get a cup of coffee.” Believe me, please believe me.

“Holy shit what happened to your face?”

“Nothing, it’s nothing. I need to use the bathroom.” I move past her and toward the back of the diner. I walk through the bathroom door and lean against it closing my eyes, jumping slightly when I hear the water turn on. I move out the way to let the bear out. I ignore his eyes as they roam my body as he walks out. 

I walk across the bathroom to the handicap stall, closing and locking the door. I line the seat with toilet paper and sit down. I stare at the wall, at the floor, at my shoes before bringing my hand up and touching the tender flesh of my face.

Blood is warm. Blood is nourishing. Blood is essential. Blood is the most natural dye in the world. It can stain your hands… your legs… your clothes… your soul. The presence of it can stop your heart. Blood is mesmerizing.

I get up off the toilet seat and lower my body to the floor, the dirty, filthy floor of the Liberty Diner. I open my bag and pull out my kit. Brian got rid of my other one. He threw it out. I bought a new one the next day. I couldn’t breathe without it. I open the kit and look at the contents. I stare. I stare. I stare. I think of all the things that my father said and all the emotions that I have had over the past few weeks, since the last time. 

I move on auto-pilot, coasting through the motions. I sit the kit on the floor in front of me and quickly unbuckle my belt and pants, sliding them down and exposing my thighs. The tiles are cold on my cotton covered ass. I reach into the box with shaking fingers and pull out the scalpel that I took from class so many months ago. I press the tip to the skin on my thigh and the small pinch sends a rush to every nerve. I gasp. 

I drag the scalpel over my skin, making small cuts, long cuts, medium cuts and they all feel good. I start to rock, slowly, back and forth. The feeling is heaven. All I can see is red. I move to the other leg, pressing into the skin. The blood is flowing more freely as my cuts get reckless and my thoughts become more jumbled. 

I barely see the red as it drops from my body and paints the tiles on the floor. “I loved you.” I repeat it over and over again. I don’t hear myself. 

I move to my arms, one gash then two, multiple injuries. “I loved you.” I can’t see. My vision is blurry. I feel light headed. More cuts. Reckless pain management. 

I don’t hear the bathroom door open. My legs are visible under the stall door. The blood is forming a small pool in between my legs. I stop moving. I can’t see through the tears. I can’t feel… anything. “Hey, are you okay?” I hear a voice. He is banging on the door. “Hey… HEY!”

I hear a sound. Is someone climbing up the stall? “Holy fucking shit.” I hear footsteps, running. I hear rushed movements and shouting. I hear banging on the door. I can’t see through the pain. Someone climbs the stall wall again. The door is unlocked. 

I hear muffled voices and shouts. Utter chaos. 

“Don’t touch him, all the blood,” someone shouts. “He could have something.” 

“Call an ambulance.” My ears perk up. My mouth mumbles. 

“No,” I breathe out. I am barely audible. “No… hospital,” I say. I can’t move. “Brian,” I whisper. 

“No… hospital… no hosp….”

“Brian.” Blackness.


	18. Rose Water

Thank you to my beta Carly. She is the most awesome, awesome to ever be awesome. Thanks to Britt for hounding me.

* * *

Personal demons are not meant to breathe the air. They roam and burrow below the surface of your skin. My demons make me itch. I can feel them moving inside of me. I want to burn them alive. I want to dissect them. I want to know everything about them and how they came to be. I want to push them away and off of me. I want to do all these things, but whenever I come one step closer to letting them go… I snatch them back. I don’t let them go. I can’t. I hold onto them, afraid to live without them. Exorcism.

Everyone is staring at me. Everyone is waiting for me to move. I blink. 

I am having streams of consciousness, and then… I am fully alert. My nerves spring back to life and I start to move. Everything comes into focus. I see the blood. My heart beats faster. I see the cuts. My heart beats faster. My hands start to shake. I am spinning.

Slowly… slowly… slowly they all start to filter out of the bathroom, my alert state extinguishing some of their curiosity. 

For just a moment they were concerned. Or were they? Did they just want to see what all the commotion was about? Did they want to be in the know? Maybe, who knows? The ones who are really concerned are still here, still watching me, still waiting. The rest have gone back to their food. Another twink, another problem. 

I can’t stop my hands from shaking. I push off the floor and stand on my feet. The world is tilted, moving. Debbie is talking to me, what is she saying? I need to focus. “Justin, sunshine, the ambulance is on its way,” she says to me. I grip the tiled wall, steadying myself. I can see the man who jumped the stall, he is staring at me. I move my hands and lean my weight against the wall. I reach down to pull up my pants, wincing in pain as the jean material scraps over the open cuts. 

I button my jeans, my breath coming out in spurts as every movement highlights a moment from this evening. I should never have gone to dinner. I should never have let myself believe that things could ever be the same again. “I’m not going to the hospital.” 

The blood on my legs is soaking into my jeans, making them heavy. I gather my things and make my way, painfully, out of the diner, blood still staining the bathroom floor. 

“Justin, you have to go to the hospital. Those cuts can get infected.” I know. 

The slight chill in the air is a comfort as the bell above the diner door signals my exit. I am ten steps away from the diner when I see the ambulance pull up and the paramedics jump out. Debbie is on them in a flash, pointing to me. I see her signal to Kiki and I know what she just told her to do. Call Brian. Fuck… Me. 

“Sir, we got a call that you were in need of some medical attention. What seems to be the problem?”

No, I don’t want your help. “No, I am fine. I am going to go home,” I tell them. I can feel my head spinning again, the loss of blood is starting to really effect me. I don’t waiver in my position.

“You seem to have some kind of injury. You are bleeding,” he says to me as he points at my jeans, the thigh area is drenched in blood and the blood on my arms is drying into the cement below. I look down at myself. I look like an extra from a horror movie. 

“No, I… don’t… want… your… help,” I say, pausing in between each word so that they get the point. The paramedic tries to get me to come and let them look at me. But I know. I know that once I get into that ambulance they are going to take me to the hospital. I know. 

After five minutes he finally gives up. His partner brings over a clipboard; the kind with the pen attached and hands it to me.

“We need you to sign these papers saying that you refuse treatment.” I grab the dangling pen and sign. 

**

“So, how did you manage to get out, alone?” Michael asks me. I line up my shot and hit the ball into the hole, circling the table to set up my next shot. I roll up my sleeve back up before leaning down and inspecting the table.

“Justin went to dinner at his mother’s.” I say. I make no indication of my feelings. I just state the fact. Michael accepts this and leans against the table as I shoot again and miss. 

“He doesn’t see her a lot, does he?”

“Well, not everyone can be as attached to their mother as you are Mikey.” The vibration in my pocket halts me from the rest of what I am going to say. “Yeah,” I say into the phone. I listen in silence as Kiki from the diner tells me a jumble of information. All I hear is Justin and blood.

“Who was it? Is everything okay?” Michael asks. 

“I have to go,” I say. I drop the cue on the table and walk out of the bar. I know Michael is going to want to know what’s going on, but I don’t have time to answer his questions right now. I walk out of Woody’s, hop into the corvette and head toward the loft.

**

Nothing feels like metal. It can be cold. It can be warm. It can be as silent as the grave or tell all your secrets to the world. Metal can be strong. Metal can be easily dented. Metal can be all those things, but right now as I stand here, leaning my forehead against the metal door, all I want it to do is make me… disappear.

I push the door open and walk into the loft, sliding the door closed behind me. It’s dark. It’s quiet. No one is here. I walk into the bathroom and strip out of all my clothes. Blood is trailing down my legs, resting in the whites of my socks. I turn on the water, not bothering to adjust the temperature. I step under the cold water and close my eyes. 

I lose myself inside my own thoughts, never hearing the door open and close or the footsteps as they walk toward me. I am on the floor of the shower, watching the blood wash off and away from my body. “Justin, holy shit,” Brian says as he looks down at me. He reaches into the shower and turns the frigid water off. “Come on.”

He steps into the shower and lifts me up. “I’m sorry,” I say. I don’t know why I apologize, I just need to. He helps me out of the shower and lifts me up onto the counter. 

“What happened?” He asks as he looks at the cuts that are on my thighs and arms. The blood has been stunted by the cold water. The vessels are constricted and it flows in a more manageable manner. I can hardly see Brian. Unshed tears are pooling in my eyes.

“He was there,” I finally say. He doesn’t act like he hears me. He looks up at me as he reaches under the sink and pulls out a box, opening the lid and pulling out bandages and hydrogen peroxide. 

“Who?” He asks as he starts to clean the cuts on my body. I don’t feel his hands.

“My dad, he was there,” I say. He stops moving, only for a second before he shakes off the shock and finishes what he is doing. “He was there and my sister told him that I was gay. He hit me… he hit me.” I let my voice trail off. It’s not like it’s the first time he hit me. But, he never hit me openly, where my mom could see. I open my mouth to say something and my voice stops in my throat. 

I look down and there are bandages covering the cuts on my arms and legs. I don’t want to see bandages anymore. Brian helps me off the counter and walks with me into the bedroom. I slip into the sweats that are on the bed and pull the shirt over my head. 

I see the lights turn off and Brian comes back into the room with two bottles of water and a bottle of pain pills, leftover from my last trip to the hospital. 

He hands them to me and I take them quickly, chasing them with the water. He takes the bottle into the bathroom and I kneel down on the bed, slowly crawling over to my side before curling into a ball. “Justin,” he says as he comes back into the room and sits down on his side of the bed, facing the closet. 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I say. 

“You never want to talk about it and it’s not getting better. What am I supposed to do? Am I supposed to wait until I get the call that tells me that someone found your cold lifeless body somewhere?” He asks me. I don’t answer.

“Talk to me,” he says and I can hear how hard it is for him to try so hard to get me to open up when all he wants to do it shut down and not deal with this. I am leaving him no choice. I am forcing him to deal. I am forcing him to look at everything. I feel his arm wrap around me as the other one rests above my head. 

“I don’t know why you deal with me,” I say and the tears flow freely. 

“I‘m not ready to give up yet. I don’t like to lose,” he says and I turn my body as slowly as I can. He kisses me and I let his arms wrap around me as best as they can. 

“I am so fucked up.”

“Yeah,” he says with a laugh and I let myself laugh. I owe him that much.

**

I can’t fix your broken pieces. I can’t bear the weight of your soul. I can’t take away your hurt. I can’t breathe for you. I can hold you tightly.


	19. Rose Water

AN: Thank you to my beta Carly. You are the best. Thank you for getting it done as you coughed and hacked. I luv ya.

* * *

Pulling the covers over my head used to make all the bad things go away. All I had to do was cover my face and I was protected from anything. I rejoiced in that knowledge. I was invincible with that knowledge. I could do anything. I could be anything. I feared… nothing, because if I was scared all I had to do was cover my head. All I had to do was close my eyes. All I had to do… was wait for the light.

And then I grew up.

I grew up and now the covers do not hold their same power. I cannot block out the fear or the pain. I am exposed… out in the open. Vulnerable. 

Rise and Shine.

“Justin, come on get up. We have to leave in like an hour,” Brian says. I don’t move. Maybe if I don’t move he will forget all about me. I know the chance is slim to none, but I can still hope. He comes over and kicks me lightly and still I stay under the blankets. “Justin, I know you’re not sleeping.”

I moan lightly and shift a little. “I’m not going. I change my mind,” I say. I feel the covers leave my body.

“You’re going… or I can call Marc and ask him to make a very expensive, yet much needed, emergency house call,” Brian says. I don’t answer. My eyes are closed, he can’t see me. I am invisible.

“Fine, we’ll play it your way.” He moves away from the bed and I hear him moving around the loft. I open my eyes, actually acknowledging the sun for the first time today. I reach down and pull the duvet back up and over my body, shutting out the light. I let my body drift back to sleep.

Paint me a picture of pure perfection… I’ll show you a thousand flaws.

The blankets are pulled off of me. “Fuck off Brian. I said I’m not going,” I say as I curl into a ball. The air is thick, dripping with anticipation.

“Sorry, Brian is not here.” I open my eyes, slowly letting them adjust to the brightness. 

“What are you doing here?” I ask as my eyes follow Marc around the room. He grabs the duvet and puts it on the ledge next to the dividing panels.

“Get up,” he says. I internally flinch at the sound of his voice. He has never raised it before. Not in my presence. Not to me. I move off the bed and stand up. He looks at me, up and down, silently taking inventory.

He doesn’t speak. He moves over to the living room and sits in one of the chairs. I walk over, every step reminding me of the cuts I inflicted on myself. Every step makes me regret. Every step makes me wish I had said ‘yes’ to the paramedic. Every… single… step.

I sit on the floor across from Marc, leaning against the chair. I want to feel the softness under me. I want to be comfortable, but blood and white do not mix. Not now… not ever.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. Marc stares at me. He intertwines his fingers and lets them hang loosely again. I look at him. His jeans are slightly wrinkled. His shirt is fresh. He got dressed in a hurry, dropped everything, to come and see me. I am beyond honored. I want him to go away.

“Brian called me,” he says. “He said that you had changed your mind about coming to see me today.” I did, so why are you here, asshole?

“I don’t have anything to say.” It’s a lie. I am lying. Call me on it. Stop me, please. Throw open my closet doors and dust off my skeletons for me. I don’t want them anymore. I don’t need them. They want me.

“No, I guess you don’t have too much to say. You already carved a very interesting story into your flesh,” he says. He sits back.

“It was an accident,” I tell him, shifting uncomfortably. He nods. I feel my face flush with anger. He doesn’t believe me. I know he shouldn’t but I want him to, don’t I?

“Justin, I am not Brian. I am not your mother. I am not your best friend. I am not you. I can’t crawl inside your head and know what’s wrong. You have to open your mouth. You have to talk,” he tells me.

Anger and pain flood through me and I get up. “What do you want me to say? My fucking father showed up at my mother’s house. My sister gave him the shock of his life and he went off. I tried to be brave,” I say, my voice dropping down to a low whisper as the last words leave my mouth. 

“I did not deny it. I stood there and told him that I had a boyfriend and we were living together. I was halfway to saying that I felt complete with his dick inside me when he hit me. He hit me so hard, but I refused to cry in front of him. I walked out and….” I stop. He doesn’t need me to say anymore. He’s seen the other half of the movie, he’s read the screenplay.

We talk for hours. One minute burning into the next. I yell. I scream. I cry. I bend and I break. I come together again. Emotional Avalanche.

“Justin, I am not going to bullshit you. I think you need help. More help than I can provide for you on my own.” I feel the residue of tears on my face and I wipe them off. I nod my head. My throat is too raw and my emotions are too close to the surface to speak.

Paint my world in darkness… step out of the shadows and light my way. Say goodbye to the setting sun. Tomorrow is forever. 

“I think he is right,” Brian says as he looks at me. He is in front of the window. I am sitting on the steps. 

“What about graduation?” I say. I need as excuse, just one, to keep me here. I need a reason to stay inside of me. I need a reason to let my soul completely… collapse.

“You can still go, but this is not going to fix itself.”

“There are no visitors for the first couple of weeks.” Tell me to stay. Tell me you want me here.

**

Marc wants Justin to sign himself into a rehab clinic. He says that he thinks it will be the best thing for Justin. I think he is right, but I want Justin here with me. I look over at him. I look at the bandages on his arms. If I am selfish and tell him to stay he will. 

He’ll be here and he’ll be fine, but for how long? How long before one last cut _is_ his last cut? A slip of the hand, a break in the spirit and its all over, finished. 

“We’ll survive,” I say as he comes over and wraps his arms around me. I allow him this small amount of comfort. He needs it, so do I. We let the silence fall around us as we both take in the night. 

“I don’t want to go,” he says. 

“I know.” He is silent as he leans against me but I can hear him sniffle and I see his hand move up to his eyes. “It’ll be fine,” I tell him. 

“You know what?”

I wait for him to keep talking. He waits for me to answer him. “What?” I ask. 

He doesn’t say anything. He lets out a deep breath and watches as a drop of rain hits the window. The skies open up and as more rain falls so do his tears. 

**

“Before you lose me completely… I need to find myself.”


	20. Rose Water

Thank you to my beta Carly. She likes to MOVE IT, MOVE IT! LMAO. Thank you to Britt and Carrie for bitching and moaning so much that I was forced to work on this chapter. I also have to thank them for crying about not being thanked. Thanks guys, YOU ROCK! Now, shut up.

* * *

It is better to have loved and lost… than never to have loved at all. I don’t know if this is true. Somewhere deep down I don’t even think I care. I do know that it is easier to have never loved… than love someone so much, and not be able to touch them. 

Justin has been gone for three weeks and life has continued to go on. I knew it would. I just was hoping that there would be some sort of shift in the atmosphere, some sort of planetary re-alignment when I realized that there was someone in this world that I cared more than a little about.   
_  
“Daddy, can you push me?” I ask my father. He looks at me and gets up off the bench to push me on the swing. My legs are still too short, much shorter than my ambitions. He lifts me up onto the swing and gives me a push.  
_  
I turn the page of the photo album. It is the only one I have. It usually sits forgotten and alone in the bottom of a box in my closet. Not today. 

I have been spending a lot of time alone since Justin left. The bars and the backrooms of Babylon have lost their appeal. Not because Justin is not here. I could go out without him before and I can go out without him now, but, I just feel different. I am different. I need to be.   
__  
“Where is mommy?” I ask my father.

_“She had to go away for a little while,” he tells me. I try desperately to kick my legs out and propel the swing on my own. I adjust my hand on the chain and grip tighter. He pushes me again. I giggle and I cannot help but see the smile on my father’s face._

_“Where did she go?” I ask him. He looks up at the sky, searching for something to say, anything. A simple explanation for a situation that is anything but simple. I kick my legs out again and he moves back a little to give me more space._

_“She was sick and she went away to get help.” He looks down and watches me as I try to process what he just said. I stay silent, letting it sink in._

_“She got a cold? When I get a cold mommy gives me med’cine,” I tell him. I want to be able to swing by myself so badly. My legs are frantically moving, trying to understand the rhythm._

_“She is very sick and she needs more than medicine right now,” he tells me._

_“Is she going to come back?” I ask. “Stop pushing me daddy.” He lets me go and watches as I try to do it myself._

_“Yeah Brian, I hope she comes back.” He looks over at me and I am looking up into the sky wondering why my swing has stopped moving._

_“I can’t move it daddy,” I say as I try to get the swing to start moving. My legs kick frantically but I won’t let him help me._

_“Let me give you a push,” he says._

_“NO!” I scream out. I need to do it by myself. I have to, it’s important to me. I need to know that I can do it. So, he stands back and lets me try. Fresh tears fall from my eyes and my legs stop moving as I give up… quit. “I need help daddy,” I say through the tears and sniffles._

_He walks over to the swing and stands in front of me, bending down until we are looking each other in the eye. “Hey, you did a good job, and you tried very hard. I am very proud of you.”_

_“But, I didn’t make the swing go,” I say as I wipe my tears with my shirt and stare at the ground. He looks at me and lifts my chin up so that I am looking right into his eyes._

_“Yeah, but you asked for help when you needed it,” he tells me.  
_  
A happy memory, buried inside a bed of thorns is so hard to get to… and worth more than a thousand drops of blood. 

Joan came back two days later, sober… and being overly religious. Jack, well… Jack disappeared. The funny part is that he didn’t go anywhere, but he was gone. Few and far between were the times that he smiled after my mother came back. 

We all just became _shadows_ of who we used to be. Our relationships changed. We were forced to change too… or drown, first within our family and then beyond.

Claire became a bitch. Mom became an even bigger lush. Dad, well, he turned into an asshole, a bitter, jaded old man, who did not understand the direction that his life took. 

Me… I became hard, and instead of just blocking them out, I blocked out everything. It was me against the world.

**

Independence is a fickle thing. You want it so much and then when you get it you realize that you need someone else. You want someone else. 

There is nothing in this room. The walls are white. The chairs are gray. There is coffee on a table in the corner, cookies next to that and a stack of little white Styrofoam cups. 

Everything is exactly the same… and everyone is different.

I pick at the plastic on my ID tag, peeling it open a little on the side. I try not to pay too much attention to the other people and I think it is paying off, no one is noticing me. 

Speak too soon and shatter my solitude.

“Justin, turn your sign around,” Gerri says. She is my counselor and she is also the one who insisted that I wear this giant sign around my neck, a wonderful accessory to my ID tag.

I reach around my neck and turn my tag around, smiling sarcastically at Gerri as I complete the motion. “So, how come you never show anybody what’s in that book you’re always carrying around?” Freddy asks me with a huge smile on his face. Freddy is my roommate. He is okay, but he can be an asshole.

“Fuck you,” I say as I shift in my seat. Gerri looks at me and frowns. I know she is making a mental note. “What? What the fuck are you thinking now?” I say. I am tired and I am frustrated.

“Justin, that language _and that attitude_ is uncalled for, and Freddy has the right to ask any question he wants.” I sit forward in the chair.

“He is only asking me that _shit_ because _you_ made me wear this stupid fucking… fucking _thing_ with all this shit written on it,” I say as I tap the piece of laminated cardboard that is lying on my chest. My sign says ‘I don’t like to talk, so ask me anything.’

“Justin,” Gerri warns. I sit back and cross my arms over my chest. “Justin,” she says again and I look over at her before addressing the group.

“I draw pictures of my family and friends,” I tell them. They don’t care. Gerri congratulates me for sharing, as usual, and Freddy laughs. Sad ass Meredith starts to talk and I tune her out. I have not listened to a word she has said in days.

I sit through the group session and try not to listen to all the voices as they come and go. The rest of the day is the same way. They talk and I don’t listen. 

The group session transforms into my private session. Everything is a blur. I don’t want to see her. She does want to see me. We are all alone in a room with a million thoughts… and not one thing to say.

“Your behavior in the group session today was not called for,” she says to me. 

“Freddy is a fucking asshole,” I say. She deducts another point from my chart and I wince. I have ten points for the week now. When you get down to five points you cannot use the phone. I have been there, right on the edge before and never crossed over the line. 

“Now, where did we leave off last session?” She asks me as she looks at her notes. I sit there. I know it’s a rhetorical question. “Okay, I think we had finally gotten to Shaun Peters. Let’s talk about him.”

I shift and I know it is obvious. “I don’t want to,” I tell her.

“It’s not a choice,” she tells me. There is no wonder why Mark recommended and specifically signed me up with her. She is a ball buster.

“What do you want to hear?” I ask. She leans over on the desk, her manicured nails adding some softness to her thirty-five year old personality and demeanor. 

“What do you want to tell me?” She asks, throwing the question back in my face. She is tapping her pen on the desk calendar in front of her.

“Not a fucking thing,” I say nonchalantly. She marks off another point. FUCK.

“Well, in that case….” She says as she looks at me. “… I want to know everything.” She sits back and takes her shoes off, crossing her legs. I can tell from her movements that that is what she is doing. She does the same thing every Monday, Tuesday, and Friday… the same exact thing. 

I decide to say nothing. Instead I lean back in the chair and cross my arms. “You know the deal Justin, the longer you stay silent… the longer you have to stay.”

“Shaun goes to my school,” I say. She wants me to talk and I want to go, so I talk to her. If it gets me out of here it’s worth it. “I don’t really know what else you want to know.” I am uncomfortable. I don’t want to talk about Shaun. I don’t want to think about him either but I do, at least three times a day.

“Were the two of you friends?” She asks. I look over at her as I try to swallow any and every emotion I have about the subject. 

“No, or I guess I can say we were… _okay_ , with each other. At least we were, until he sucked my dick. It only happened once, but after that he was pissed. It kinda put a damper on our Sunday afternoon tea sessions,” I tell her with a smile.

“I’ll bet. Did he ever make any other sexual advances toward you, or did you ever make any toward him?” She asks. I stare into her. 

“Why don’t you just ask what you really want to ask?”

“And what would it be that I really want to ask?” She is writing down notes. It is very irritating when you are trying to be pissed at someone and they are not even looking up at you.

“You want to know if I ever tried to fuck him, or if he ever tried to fuck me,” I say. I am getting flushed and agitated. I am lashing out at her because she is much too close to the truth. ”Well, the answer is ‘No’, because once he started kicking my ass every time he saw me, I lost my hard-on for him. Oh but you wanna know what _really_ sealed the deal?” I ask. I am getting frantic. My hands and mouth are moving fast and I am talking loud.

Give her an inch. Keep the yard.

“The best part… oh man, wait till you hear this. The best part is that after a particularly rough night, I went to see Brian. I was so happy when I left, and then I stepped off the bus in my neighborhood and ran smack into Shaun. Well, Shaun, being the altruistic… caring soul that he is… decided that he needed his cock sucked and I was the perfect one to do it.” I stand up and start to move back and forth across the floor. Her eyes follow my every step.

“He pulled out a knife, pressed it to my neck and led me to his house.” I am shouting and tears are streaming down my face, creating streaks of sadness along my plastic neck accessory. 

“He stuck his dick so far down my throat that I almost threw-up. He fucked my face until he shot his load. I can still feel it sliding down the inside of my throat and settling in my stomach. Anyway, I reacted… and clamped down so hard on his fucking dick that I almost bit it off,” I say. Gerri is stunned, speechless. “Let’s not even talk about my best friend that I _know_ he raped and almost killed.” 

I was so caught up in my own emotions that I never saw her move from around the desk. I never felt her arms slip around me, but I feel them now and I frantically move back to get them off of me. My skin feels like a thousand ants are crawling all over me. I need to get out of here. I don’t want to see her face right now. I just can’t. “I want to go. Can I go, please?” 

She takes my neck ID and my sign and stores it in my locker. We only wear them in the public rooms. The rest of the time we are identified by the two non-removable plastic ID bands on our wrists. One band has our name and other information, the other one has our disorder. The ones that name our disorders are color coded, for their convenience and our humiliation. 

Mine is red, bright red. 

I race out of her office and to my room, flying past Freddy to get to the bathroom. I close the bathroom door behind me and lock it. The only light is the remainder of sunlight from outside. My heart is beating fast. I am frantic and my hands are shaking. I cross over the floor and throw open the medicine cabinet. There is nothing sharp in it. 

I move bottles and supplies. I take everything out of the cabinet until there are only shelves inside. I need something, anything. I need to release the pain. I scratch at my arms and legs, trying to stop the feeling of ants crawling all over me. I strip out of my clothes and turn on the shower. My hands are shaking so hard I can barely grip the knobs. 

I step inside and let the water wash over me, but it does not help. The feeling is still there. Something is on me, inside of me. I can feel it. I reach for my towel. The one I left hanging there earlier and start to rub. I rub every part of my skin as the water gets hotter and hotter. The steam rises from inside the stall, filling the bathroom at a steady pace.

Lose track of space and time.

“Justin, are you okay? You’ve been in there for a really long time.” I don’t hear Freddy. I don’t hear anything, except the beating of my own heart and my own voice screaming in my ears. “If you don’t open this door I am going to get someone.” My skin is protesting. It is turning bright red and I welcome the sting. 

Pandora’s Box is full of secrets. Open it up. Spill them out. It’s the first step. It is time to start to heal. 

“Justin, open the door.” Gerri’s voice comes into me and I stop moving. My whole body is shaking and the water is not hot anymore. It is cold, ice cold.

“Go away,” I say and I know it is barely audible. Between the water and their talking I know she did not hear me. “Go away,” I say a little louder. 

“Justin, please open the door. We don’t want to have to bust it down.”

“GO AWAY!” I shout, loud and clear. It is too late. The damage is done. They are taking the door off the hinges and I am still sitting here. I can’t move. I don’t think I want to. I want to see Brian. I want him to hold me and tell me that everything is going to be okay. I need it, even if it is just for a little while.

And the walls come tumbling… tumbling… tumbling down. 

Gerri comes in the bathroom and looks around. She steps up to the shower and pulls the curtain open. I am sitting on the floor, huddled in the corner and shaking. I don’t feel the cold. I know my skin is raw. I can feel every drop of water that touches me. “Justin,” she says and reaches out a hand to touch me.

“LEAVE ME ALONE,” I shout. I am trembling.

“Come on Justin, you need to get out of the water. You are going to get sick,” she says. If I was not so tired I would laugh at the irony of what she just said. She tries to touch me again and I flinch slightly.

“Don’t touch me.” She seems to realize that the water is running and decides to turn it off, basking in her ability to do… something. I stay where I am on the floor in the shower. Gerri turns and leaves the room. I can hear her on the phone. She is talking to someone and I can almost guarantee it is Marc.

“He won’t come out,” I hear her say. I can only hear one side of the conversation. I want to hear both. “Well, what did they do?” She asks and I wonder what they are talking about. I am so tired. “Do you think he will come?” She asks. I know she is talking to Marc and I know she is talking about Brian.

“It’s worth a try. Can you come too?” She asks. “Great, thanks a lot.” I see her in the doorway. Part of me wonders why she does not make me come out. Part of me wonders why she does not have some of the medical staff come and forcibly remove me. I don’t know and I guess it really does not matter.

**

I am halfway into a night of restless sleep when my phone rings. I reach over and grab the cordless. I press talk and hold it to my ear. “What?” I ask. It is after one in the morning. 

“Brian, this is Marc Jacobs, Justin’s….”

I stop breathing and sit up. “I know who you are. What’s wrong?” I ask as I get out of the bed. He takes too long to answer me, too long to make a sound, to do anything. “Did he run off?”

“No, and if you really don’t mind I would prefer not to talk about it over the phone. Do you think you can meet me at the clinic?” He asks me. I walk into the bathroom after getting directions from Marc and hanging up.

Run, run as fast as you can.

Thirty minutes later and I am on the road headed to the Georgia K. Lansing Rehabilitation Clinic. It is cold. It is late. It is dark. I want to be anywhere but where I am. I would not change where I am for anything in the world. Justin needs me. I don’t even know why, but I am on my way. 

The past and the future are terribly good enemies. One can feast on the other, sometimes rendering the host useless. The trouble lies when you can no longer tell the difference between the one who’ll hurt you… and the one who will lead you into safety. 

I park my car and turn the engine off. I don’t want to get out and go in, but I do. I open my car door and step out onto the pavement, shutting the door behind me. “Brian, I am so glad you could make it here so quickly,” Marc says as I enter the building. The floors are white linoleum. The walls are a muted gray. The lights are dimmed. 

White is the color of good. White is the color of evil. White is the color of purity. White is expansive. White is sterile. White is happiness. White is sadness. White is the color of anticipated death. 

Soft noises flow throughout the halls, telling you that not everyone is asleep… not everyone is resting comfortably.

“What the fuck is going on?” I ask. Marc drops his hand just as we are joined by a medium build, brunette. She cannot be any older than Marc or I, but the demeanor she projects is well aged and perfected. She does not seem like a bitch, far from one, but she is assertive and sometimes they’re both the same.

“You must be Mr. Kinney?” She says as she reaches us. No, I just really need to see Justin Taylor at two in the morning.

“Brian,” I tell her. She nods her head greets Marc. ”What’s going on?” I ask again. She turns to walk back down the hall, motioning for us to follow her. 

“Justin has named both of you as the people that are allowed to be informed of his private matters. If you did not already know,” she says as she leads us into her office. I don’t sit down. I can’t. “Justin had a particularly bad one on one session today. We delved into the subject of Shaun Peters and this seemed to make Justin very uncomfortable. He blew up, and in his frenzied state he told me of a forced sexual encounter that occurred between him and Shaun Peters.” 

“What?” I ask as I step a little closer to the desk. I never knew about that. Marc and Gerri both look at me and I know they are both thinking the same thing. They want to know why Justin didn’t tell me. I know that is what they are thinking, because I am thinking it too.

“Justin does not like to talk. He holds it all in and then he explodes.” I look at her confused. She knows what is going through my head and answers me before I can say anything. “I know he cries, but… umm, it’s like a pressure cooker….” Her hands are moving in front of her; my own little demonstration. “… He cries but the real problem is still there, only less intense. That’s what the cutting does for him. He can cut and cut until he feels release, no pain… only pleasure.” 

“So, what does that have to do with why I am here right now?” I ask. I am still thinking about Shaun and how much I want to kill him. 

“Justin has been in the bathroom for the past few hours. He won’t let anyone else come near him. We thought that maybe… he’d come out for you.” 

“Why didn’t you just have one of your nurses go in and get him out of the bathroom?” I ask. 

“Brian, Justin is very volatile. We want him to blow-up and get angry. What we don’t want is for him to shut back down again. We can’t afford for him to do that… neither can he.” I lock my tongue into the side of my cheek and look over at her and then at Marc. He has been silent. He already knows all about Justin. They are working together to help him.

The Labyrinth is deep, and very, very long.

**

Show me your insanity… and I’ll show you mine.

Dark shadows can hide your biggest fears. Come and sit down next to me. Tell me all your secrets. I’ll tell you mine. The sun is gone. I don’t know how long I have been sitting in this bathroom. I have no idea why I did not turn the lights on. I am cold, freezing cold, but I don’t move. I need the pain. I see the light spill into the bathroom as the main door to the room is opened.

I hear the footsteps move through the room and stop at the bathroom door. Whoever-it-is is looking inside the bathroom. Before I have a chance to think, the person flips the lights on and my eyes slam shut. “Fuck, turn the fucking light off,” I say. I hear the light switch flip again and I open my eyes. “Brian,” I say in a whisper.

Water… water… everywhere.

“Are you planning on getting out of the shower?” He asks. I look up at him and say nothing. He leans in and starts to pull me up, slowly. I am not ready to be touched. I am not ready.

“Don’t touch me,” I tell him. “Leave me alone.” He stands up straight and pulls me to my feet, pushing a towel into my chest and dragging me out of the stall. I almost trip over the edge as he pulls me forward. He pushes me down on Freddy’s bed. Freddy is not here. He is probably in Moaning Meredith’s room. He is always sneaking in there.

She has a private room. Daddy’s little girl. Bitch.

Brian turns the lights on and I automatically bury my face in the towel that he pushed into me. “Turn the lights off!” I scream. He doesn’t. I open my eyes, slowly letting them get use to the light. “What the fuck are you doing here?” I am still angry. I want someone to feel what I feel, except, I have no idea what I feel. I feel everything, maybe that’s the problem.

“Your wonderful doctor called me ‘cause Justin wouldn’t come out the big bad bathroom,’” he says as he mocks my voice. “I was almost asleep.” He takes off his jacket and tosses the leather onto my desk chair. “So, why didn’t you tell me about Shaun?” He asks me.

FUCK! I didn’t want him to know that. Why does he know that? Who told him that? “Who the fuck told you about that, and why should I have told you?” He looks at me, a smirk playing across his face. I get up and walk over to my drawer. I pull out a pair of sweats and slide into them. 

“Gerri told me,” he says. I stare at him. “It should have been you.” He gets up. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to fight with him. 

“I don’t want to talk about this,” I say as I try to turn away from him. He grabs onto my arm and keeps me in place, facing him. 

“Bullshit, you are not walking away from this. I am not your fucking doctor. I am not your therapist. I am not your mother or your asshole father. You want to scream and yell? Fine, but I am not going to let you vent and then walk away.” He releases my arm and I stand still. “Why didn’t you tell me about Shaun?”

“Tell you what? That he made me suck his dick. Tell you that he sucked mine before and that I used to have the biggest fucking crush on him. Tell you that it wasn’t the first time that he made me do what he did. WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT TO KNOW?” I scream the last part. Tears are flowing from my eyes and I can hardly see. 

“Justin,” he says. He didn’t know it was more than once. No one knows. This is the first time I have said it out loud. This is the first time that I have acknowledged it. This is the first time. 

Brian moves forward and I take a step back. 

“You think I am running away from everything. I can’t run away, it’s in me. I can feel it, crawling inside my body and living inside my skin. I never have a moment’s peace.” I look at Freddy’s bed and start to rip the sheets off the thin mattress. I knock the lamp off the stand in my hurry and the bulb shatters to pieces on the hard floor. I move to my side of the room and start to rip all my drawings from the wall. “All of this is bullshit,” I say as I tear down more pictures… more pieces of the puzzle.

“Justin, stop,” Brian says. I am moving without trying. I don’t need to tell my body which ones to pull down next. I don’t need to tell myself what has to be destroyed.

“I want… I want….” I stop talking. I don’t know what to say. “I just want to be… normal.”

Brian gets up and wraps his arms around me, pulling me close, trying to offer some sort of comfort. I don’t want him. I turn around in his arms and try to push him away from me. He lets me push and hit and scratch him and he doesn’t move. I can’t fight anymore. I let my arms fall to my sides and I take his smell into me. “Normal is overrated,” he whispers to me. 

I slowly let my arms come up and wrap around his waist. I hold on tightly and cry. I let go of everything. I hold nothing back. Brian lets me cry. He stays silent and lets me cry. Tears and snot decorate his shirt and my face, and still he kisses me. I let him. I need the gesture. He needs to know that I am still here.

All of our emotions are like static in the room, bouncing off of every surface and waiting to strike. Brian walks us backwards until we are sitting on my bed. We lay down, me on top of him. We never let go of each other. I continue to cry and he reaches up and grabs some tissue. He hands it to me and I clean my face up.

I feel the heat of his hands press into my back and I yawn. Five minutes go by and I feel my eyes start to close. I feel his hands smooth down my back one last time before I fall into a deep sleep. 

Kiss me goodbye… until the morning.

**

I pull the blanket up and over Justin’s exposed back and kiss the top of his head. I don’t know what to do with the information that I have learned. I look down at Justin’s face. Tear marks, and tears that have not had a chance to dry, sit on his face, waiting. I cannot help but to let out a smile. 

I finally let someone in, and they are as fucked up as me. Figures.


	21. Rose Water

AN: My beta is out of town. All mistakes are to be blamed on THE MAN.

* * *

Everyone feels sorry for you… and the only thing you want… is not to have their pity.

There is nothing like floating inside of reality. When you are so happy… you can’t even put it into words. When you are so scared that the thought of life makes you want to cry. You are suspended, stuck… between heaven and hell. It is one of the most dangerous, most destructive, most beautiful places to be. The air is sweat and blood. The ground is pain. There is nothing in front of you… and nothing behind.

The sky is dark. Death lives in this place. Life lives in this place. I live in this place. Membership is exclusive. You have to die again… and again… and again, just to earn the right… to live. 

I am leaving. The lights are dimming. Membership… revoked.

“I don’t want to get up,” I say to Brian. His hand is resting on my back. I know he is awake. I know he hears me. “If I get up it may all just be a dream, you may not be here. You may not be real,” I finish. His hand falls away from my back and I feel it as it touches the side of my face. I look up at him, resting my chin on his chest.

“I’m here,” he says. I don’t cry. The time for tears has come and gone. “Come on, lets get cleaned up,” he says, nicely, softly, gently. Fragile. 

Break me into pieces and shatter the vessel that used to house my soul.

I move off of him and he stands up, fully clothed, leather jacket thrown to the side. He offers me his hand and I slide my hand inside of his. We walk into the bathroom together, clothes coming off slowly, piece by piece. 

Hesitation, desire, pity, love, trust, humiliation and determination are sucking at the air that moves around us.

He reaches into the shower, turning the water on. The heat engulfs the bathroom and I feel something like sadness, but not as heavy. 

He pulls me into the shower behind him. His hands grip the soap, working up the lather. “Brian, what happens next?” I ask softly.

“You’re writing the book, anything you want,” he tells me. We finish washing each other. He steps out of the shower, leaving me alone. Yesterday I would have fallen to the floor, dropped down and prayed for the tiles to tell me what to do. I see Brian out of the corner of my eye. I see him drying off. I see him slipping back into the clothes he wore here. 

Map out my destiny. Burn any traces of my presence in the past. My end has no beginning. 

Brian walks out of the bathroom. I stay where I am, quietly letting the water wash over me. I take a deep breath and look at the tiles. I look ahead of me. I look into me. I turn off the water and for a brief moment I stand there, water dripping off of me as I put my thoughts in order.

The earth freezes. The trees go bare. The air is hot and dry. The rain comes down in torrents. Life... begins again.  
 _  
“I’m not strong enough,” I say to Daphne as she reaches the first branch of the giant tree, climbing farther and farther away. “I’m going to fall.”_

_“No you’re not. All you gotta do is pull yourself up,” Daphne tells me. I reach for the second branch of the tree and pull with all of my might. My body lifts off the ground and I realize I can do anything. I am the bravest boy in the world._

_I was only eight.  
_   
Walk in the woods with me. No one will hear us, no one will see.

“My dad loves the spring,” I say. I get up and walk a foot away before pausing, my eyes trained on the lake in front of us. “He used to say that in the spring, everything is beginning. Everything is new. The colors, the air, the expectations, it’s all… fresh. He said that the spring… gave you a whole new chance, to start over.”

“Yeah,” Brian says from his spot behind me. I can tell he is rolling his eyes. I can hear it in his voice. I move away from him and walk out to the edge of the water. I look down into the darkened depths. 

Fish and ducks are living their lives here, silently going through the motions of another day. I look up into the sun and then back down at the water. 

“It would be so easy wouldn’t it? To just _accidentally fall in_. You wouldn’t have to deal with anyone or anybody. It really may be the best way to go. I mean, why make everyone worry about you?” Brian says as he comes up behind me. I know what he is doing. I hear him loud and clear.

“But,” he says as he moves to wrap his arms around me. “The Justin that I know, he wouldn’t give up so easily.” He kisses the side of my head and lets his arms slip from around my waist. 

My breath catches as Brian grabs my hand and turns me around, pulling me into him for a heated kiss. He runs his hands through my hair and I deepen the kiss, needing the contact. “I want to go home. I want you to stay,” I say as my lips rest against his. 

“I know. Who wouldn’t want to go home with me?” He asks and I laugh. He kisses me one last time before pulling me back toward the clinic. He has to go. I have to cope. 

Give me directions. I’ll meet you in the middle on my way back home.

I walk with Brian to his car, the wet pavement making our movements slow and calculated. “Will you call me?” I ask. 

“Yeah,” he says as we reach the car and he unlocks the door. He throws his jacket inside and it lands on the seat with a soft thud, the sound of leather on leather. He stands up straight and pulls me in; close enough so that we are almost one. Are we one? Or, are we just… absolute?

I lift myself up on my toes, just slightly and let my lips meet and melt into his. He parts his mouth and I shiver as I feel his tongue snake into my mouth and his cock grow hard against my leg. “Mmm,” I moan as the kiss takes me home and brings me back again.

He slowly breaks the kiss and moves his mouth away from mine. I wait for him to give me a parting speech, some words of wisdom to help me along the way. Instead he smiles, bites his bottom lip and leans in close, so close our foreheads are touching. 

I watch him as his lips part and I cannot stop the smile from spreading through me. I steady myself for his knowledge, his insight. “I want to fuck you,” Brian says. His hands want to roam and explore, but we both know that despite the appearance to the contrary, we are not alone in this parking lot.

“I know,” I say as our lips fall together again. “Later?”

“Later,” he says as he backs away from me, biting his lower lip. He gets into his car and pulls out of the parking space. As I stand there watching him go I smile and shiver. 

I have to move. 

**

And they lived happily ever after. No one tells you that sometimes, the fairytale doesn’t work that way.

I press the coffee cup to my lips and cautiously take in the heated liquid. “I told you from the beginning that Craig Taylor was going to be nothing but trouble, but you wouldn’t listen to me. You were always so stubborn,” my mother says. She never liked Craig, never. I should have listened to her.

“I know,” I say. I keep my eyes on the trees across the street. I don’t want to look at her. Right now the scenery outside this kitchen window is my only salvation. “I know,” I repeat, more to myself than to her.  
“We’ll at least the bastard has to pay,” she reasons. I smile as I think about the look on his face that day in the lawyer’s office. It was priceless. “Jennifer, where is Justin? I have been here for a whole day and a half and I have not seen one hair on the boys head.”

I knew she would ask about him. What do I do? What do I say? 

The truth shall set you free, but a lie, a lie… can keep you loved.

“He, he is in rehab,” I say. My right hand flutters to my neck, twisting the pearls that hang there, begging them to help me. My left hand holds on tightly to the coffee mug. Stay cool, stay calm. 

“Oh, my God, what for, is it drugs dear?” She asks me. I suppress a laugh. Drugs, I wish. If only it were that easy. 

“No, its not drugs mother,” I say. Tell her, tell her quick and get it over with. “He is what they call, a cutter.”

I can feel her eyes as they burn into my back, trying to understand. “What does that mean dear? I have no idea what you are talking about,” she tells me as she takes a sip of her tea. I put my mug down, closing my eyes as the porcelain makes contact with the counter. I leave the window, my portal into serenity, and sit down at the table, across from her.

“Mom, Justin cuts himself, mostly with razors,” I tell her. Her mouth drops open as I continue to talk, to tell her everything I know, which admittedly, is not a lot. 

“Where is he?” She asks me as she stands up. “Where is he? I want to see him.” She moves out of the kitchen and into the foyer. “How long has he been there?” She pauses at the front door when she realizes that I am not following her, or answering her. 

Suddenly, I am five years old with paint on my hands and a stain on the carpet. “I don’t know,” I mumble, hands down and heart beating fast. My mother turns around to face me. She is waiting for me to continue. I have nothing left to say. 

“Well,” my mom says. She wants answers and she wants them, now. My hands find their way to my neck, the collar of my shirt, the beads around my neck. I want to breathe, my lungs won’t let me. 

Good evening Mr. and Mrs. America and all the ships at sea, let’s… go to press.

“Justin doesn’t live here anymore,” Molly says as she walks down the stairs. She is not afraid of her grandmother, she never has been and she has never needed to be. There was never a question that Justin was my mother’s favorite. To her Molly was merely the back up table setting. She was to be appreciated and treated kindly, but never touched.   
__  
“Do you really want to have another baby?” I look at my mother, my eyes a mixture of fear, restraint and anger. “He cheats on you. Everyone knows it. I know it. You know it. All you have to do… is let yourself believe it.”

_“He said he isn’t, and I believe him,” I say and the words sound like a lie, even to me. My mother comes closer to me, placing her hands on my face and pulling me close. She used to do the same thing when I was little. When she wanted me to focus, really focus, she held my head and _made_ me listen, made me see, but I am older now and my vision… is not what it used to be._

_“Why are you trying so hard, to fix something that is beyond repair?”  
_  
“Is that true Jen? Jennifer, do you hear me, is it true?” My mom does not trust Molly’s explanation for her brother’s absence. She waits for me to confirm or deny and suddenly I don’t have the energy to do either one. 

“It’s true, it really is,” Molly says, not waiting for my brain to engage. My mom lets go of the door handle and closes the gap between us. She stops at the bottom of the stairs, her attention divided between me and Molly. 

“Well, if he hasn’t been staying here, where has he been staying?” She asks. Molly takes two steps down, her body level with my mothers.

“He, he lives with a man named Brian Kinney,” I say. 

“It’s his boyfriend,” Molly says with a smile as she crosses her arms over her chest. My mother’s head turns to Molly. I cannot tell what she is thinking, and that scares me. I cut my eyes at Molly and gently shake my head. 

“His boyfriend, are you telling me that my grandson is living with another man, and that they are engaged in a sexual relationship?” She asks. Her head is facing Molly, but her words are directed at me.

“Yup,” Molly says with a smile on her face. “And he is very cute.” Molly sits down on the bottom step, one leg crossed over the other. I cannot help but to smile, there is no denying that Brian is cute. 

“Who is this Brian? I want to see him, and I want to see him now.” I am surprised. I knew she would be a lot of things, but being in a hurry to see Brian is not one of them.

**

Wake up and say hello to the first day of your life. Meet it head on… or die trying.

“Freddy, would you please stop doing that?” I ask. Freddy smiles at me and I feel my stomach twist into a knot. I have to meet with Gerri in an hour. 

“Stop doing what?” He asks. He is sitting in his bed, directly across from me and staring. His eyes are burning into me. 

“Stop staring at me,” I say. He stops and gets up. I let my eyes shift from my paper to his feet as they make their way across the room. I feel the bed shift and look over. Freddy is sitting on my bed, next to me, on my bed. Die Freddy Die. 

“What are you drawing?” Freddy asks. I raise my head up and give him my full attention. He always wants to know what I am doing. 

“Nothing,” I say sharply. He chuckles and snatches the sketchpad from my hands. “Fuck, give that back.” Freddy jumps up and holds me back with one arm. I curse his fuller height and more ample muscle mass as I try with desperation to retrieve my book from between his fingers.

One quick movement is all it takes and I suddenly feel Freddy’s lips on mine. I don’t let myself think after the initial touch. I feel Freddy’s hand move to grip the back of my neck and the paper from my sketchpad tickles me, threatening to tell my secrets. 

Stop the press. We need to print a retraction. 

**

I pull my car up to the curb and step out. My jacket is in my hand and the sun is rising over my building. I smile at the thought. I reach the door and as I reach for the handle I hear a voice. “Hey, Brian,” I hear. I turn around and come face to face with Molly. 

“Molly, what are you doing here?” I ask. She doesn’t answer me right away, she just points in the direction of the curb. I see Jennifer and an older woman, who is still very pretty, getting out of their car. “What the fuck is going on?”

“My grandma was asking about Justin. My mom didn’t have any answers, so she asked to see you,” she says to me.

“Mr. Kinney,” the older woman says. “I am Susanna Baker and I understand that you are the one with information about my grandson,” she says. I can just imagine how she found out who I was and where I live. I look over at Molly, a smirk firmly on my face.

“Look, Mrs. Baker, Justin doesn’t want people to know where he is. When he gets back I’ll have him call you,” I say as I open the main door to the building. 

“Please, call me Susanna, and that, _Mr. Kinney_ is simply _not_ good enough,” she says as she pushes past me. She waits in the lobby to see who is winning the game. I hold my hand up, letting Jennifer and Molly know that they may as well come in too. Round one belongs to you Susanna.

Pay attention… the game’s in check.


	22. Rose Water

AN: Thank you to my beta. Carly you so fucking ROCK ASS.

* * *

Life is like quicksand, seemingly harmless until you step inside of it. You struggle, trying desperately to stay above the surface. If you’re lucky, you’ll find out it is all… an illusion. 

A smokescreen designed to make you feel safe, secure, loved, hated, appreciated and important. Significance… is oxygen.

When you’re sinking, drowning, suffocating inside your life all you want… is for someone to pull you up, rinse you off and tell you that you are loved. Loved so much by someone else that they would risk their life, follow you into the quicksand, to save you. 

Packaged romance.

I feel Freddy’s hand as it starts to move under the waist of my jeans and I impulsively thrust into him. He is under me, lying on my bed and holding me close with his arm. I let my mind wander and in an instant I see Brian’s face flash before my eyes. Freddy is kissing my neck now, sucking on the tender flesh. He is going to leave a mark, a hickey… a HICKEY. No, no, stop. Stop before it’s too late. 

If you can’t have the one you love… love the one you’re with.

My eyes fly open and I start to panic as his other hand moves under the waist of my jeans, creeping toward the front and searching for my cock. “Stop, stop,” I say as I push off of him. Freddy sits up and runs a hand over his mouth.

“What the fuck?” He asks. I grab my shirt from by his head and swing my legs over the edge of the bed, putting my back to him. “You can’t just start something and then all of a sudden stop.”

I look over at him. There is lust, anger and disappointment mixing together behind his eyes. “Yeah, I can,” I say as I grab my sketchbook off the floor and smooth out the pages. I get up and walk toward the door, grabbing my journal along the way. “I have to go see Gerri.”

I see Freddy lay back on the bed as I close the door. I wait for the latch to click behind me before letting out a huge rush of air and buckling my belt. I push away from the door and start the long walk to Gerri’s office. Every step I take as I approach the door makes me want to pause, runaway… disappear.

Every step I take… is slower than the last.

I knock on the door to Gerri’s office and wait for her to call me in. “Just a minute,” she says. Her voice comes through the intercom that is attached to the wall next to the door. 

Solid wood partition. 

My session was supposed to start ten minutes ago, but I can faintly hear Moaning Meredith in there crying so I’m not so worried anymore about Gerri being pissed. I sit down on one of the chairs across from the door and stare at the reflection of the fluorescent lights in the linoleum. I can see the reflections of the people as the walk by. I don’t recognize half of them.

I hear the door to Gerri’s office start to creak and I look up. “… And remember what we talked about, okay?” Gerri tells Meredith. 

“I will,” Meredith says as she wipes at her nose again. I sit still, praying that that’ll make me invisible. She turns to leave and looks right at me. I can see her reflection in the floor. 

Please don’t talk to me. Please don’t touch me. Move along Moaning Meredith... there’s nothing to see. I stand up and adjust my shirt.

“Justin,” she says as she throws her arms around my neck. She is always so warm and open. If it wasn’t for the crying she might be able to pass for _at least_ semi- normal. I personally blame the Care Bears for her delightful delightfulness. 

“It’s so good to see you. We all heard about what happened, are you okay, Huh?” She pushes me back and holds onto my arms as she looks at me. 

“I’m fine,” I tell her. She nods her hair and sniffs before pulling me close to her again. Her breath is warm as it plays across my neck. “Meredith, really, I’m fine.” I pull away from her and smile a little. “I’m fine.”

“Okay,” she says as she wipes at her nose again and clutches her journal close to her chest. “Well, I guess I’ll see you later,” she says.

“Yeah,” I tell her. I can go the rest of my stay without seeing Meredith. She takes too much of my energy. 

“Okay, okay, bye,” she says and takes off down the hall. I reach up and move the hair out of my face. When my arm is halfway up I smell vanilla. I bring my arm close and inhale deeply.

“Ugh,” I say quietly. “I smell like Meredith.”

“Justin, your session started some time ago, so what’d you say you come on in,” Gerri says from the comfort of her office. I walk into the office and sit down on the sofa, as far away from her as I can get. 

She pretends like she doesn’t notice. I know she does.

“How are you feeling today?” I roll my eyes and play with the pages of my journal. I told myself that it was time to let go, time to cross over the hump and start a new life. It was so easy to say. It’s not so easy to do. “Justin?”

“I’m thinking,” I tell her. It’s true, I am thinking. Gerri sits back and waits for me to talk. Why do we always have to talk? “Why do we always have to talk?” 

“Because, it’s not always good to hold everything in,” she tells me. I roll my eyes and get up off the sofa, tossing my books to the side. I walk over to the window and look down at the courtyard below. “Sometimes if we say things out loud it helps us to sort them out.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes people need to shut the fuck up,” I say as I watch the people walking around down below. “People talk too much and even when they shut up and hear you… they hardly ever listen to you. All they see are your lips moving.” 

If you’re going to walk across the fire, you might as well get burned.

“Is that why you cut yourself, because no one listens?” I don’t answer her. I can’t make it make sense for her. I can’t make her see the world through my eyes. I can’t make her into me, even if it’s for just a day. Second hand comprehension.

I turn around from the window and walk back over to the sofa. Gerri gets up and walks over to the other couch and sits down, her shoeless feet tucked under her small frame. I laugh, thinking of how much she reminds me of Daphne sitting like that. The way Daphne was before…. 

I stop myself. I can’t think about that. Not right here. Not right now.

I sit down and stare at Gerri. I force myself to swallow everything and let it all out. I am the only one who can help me.   
_  
“Brian, what happens next?”_

_“You’re writing the book, anything you want,” he tells me.  
_  
“Have you ever felt like the world was swallowing you whole, like if you moved in any direction you would stop existing?” I ask her. I don’t wait for her answer. 

“Sometimes it seems like everyone is talking at the same time. Their voices start to get tangled. Their expectations seem too big and so far out of reach, impossible, and somewhere along the way… you lose your own voice. You aren’t there anymore. All you are is what your parents want you to be, or what your boss expects you to be.” I look out the window and smile as the sun catches on the metal fixtures, sending a flash of silver into our atmosphere.

“You are this _shell_ of a person, and then one day you walk through your life and wonder when it all changed. You see all your friends, your clothes, your family but it’s all different, altered somehow. The fucked up thing though, is that you don’t remember when it all happened. When did it all change? When did life move on and leave you behind?” 

I lock eyes with her. She stopped writing awhile ago. She hears me. She is listening to me and she is doing her best to understand.

I grab my sketchpad off the sofa and open it to the first page. It is a large pad, filled with pictures, both old and new; pictures of Molly, my mom, my dad, the school, friends, enemies, hopes, dreams, fears, Brian… my life. I keep my eyes locked on her and I watch as she lets her eyes fall on the pictures in the book.

Step inside of my existence.

I let my gaze follow hers. We both look down at the sketches and as I talk, I slowly turn the pages. “And then you try to play catch up. You run and run as fast as you can to try and keep up, but no matter how hard you try… you can’t catch up. Everything is too far away, too far ahead, too far gone. And then you hear your parents fighting, yelling, screaming… and you don’t know what for. There is a razor in your hand and when it accidentally slices through your skin you wince, and you cry… but GOD it feels good to just _feel_ something.” 

I stop talking as I remember the first time I felt the tingle, the buzz of living, as it traveled down my spine and through my entire body.

“There is nothing like that moment, like that first time. No moment matches that moment, but every time after it is just as good, just as different, just as new,” I tell her. I can’t stop the tears that fall from my eyes and they splash onto the drawings, smudging the delicate charcoal and granite. 

Black and white pictures of my past. 

“Nothing matters anymore, nothing… because you’re dead. You can die over and over and over again, and every time is exciting… and even though you may not catch up to everyone and everything that left you behind, it’s okay, because the voices… the voices are quiet.”

Now can you see? Now do you understand?

“Now,” I tell her as I let the tears fall down my face and into my mouth. “Can you fix me?” Gerri looks at me and taps her pen against her yellow writing tablet before grabbing a tissue from the side table and wiping the tears from her eyes. 

“How do you feel after telling me that?” She asks. I stare at her, knowing I have stumped her, knowing I have taken away her words. 

“I feel... tired,” I tell her. She looks at me and blows her nose on the tissue. 

“That’s normal. You just took a big step. You let all your thoughts and feelings out into the open and you’re still alive,” she tells me. “The next thing we have to do is get you to target your negative behavior into something else, something that can absorb your pain and lighten your load without being harmful to you.” I nod my head and listen as she talks to me. I listen as she tells me about my feelings and my actions.

I hear her and I listen.

“Why don’t we end the session for right now? We’ll talk again tomorrow in group and we’ll see how well you are able to let others help you at the trust exercise tomorrow.” I smile and grab my journal and my sketchpad. I walk out of her office and make a beeline for the lake in the woods. 

I need to see the water. I need to see something that changes as much as I do, but that on the surface… always seems to be the same. Surface level illusion. 

Distorted reflection.

**

Family can be a noose around your neck. They can suffocate you, choke you to death. The harder you fight, the tighter the hold becomes, until the day you stop struggling.

Predator versus Prey. 

You stand still, no more fight left inside your body. You let them squeeze, collapsing your trachea and cutting off your air supply. You let them have the satisfaction of watching your soul start to give up the fight… and then, then you cut the cord, and watch them fall away.

One thousand lives and counting.

I watch Susanna as she taps her wedding ring against the glass in her hand. She accepted the water with a smile, but she won’t drink it. Well learned rules of being a gracious guest. 

“Are you going to tell me where my grandson is?” She asks. I smirk, first at her and then at Jennifer. Surely the first thing that she wanted to say was, ‘So, you’re fucking my grandson,’ but she is too polished for that.

Admire the bullshit shine of social acceptance. 

“Justin’s in a rehab clinic a few hours away from here,” I tell her. She asks me question after question. How is Justin? Justin is fine. She doesn’t need to know anything other than that. Is he eating? I think so. You don’t know for sure? I’m not Justin’s handler. He’s an adult, he can feed himself. 

We dance for what seems like years and she matches my every move. Thirty minutes go by, then an hour and then two. I’m losing my patience. “Look, I am not going to tell you where he is,” I finally say. “You are welcome to go home and call all the rehab facilities in the area and see what they tell you.” 

We fight for the winning move. To the victor… goes Justin. 

She doesn’t know that I have already won this game. There is no contest. We watch each other, she hates me, and I know it. Me? Well, to me… she doesn’t exist.

Wipe the slate clean and erase you from my memory. 

“Come Jennifer, Molly, lets go,” she says as she gets up from the sofa, placing the glass on the table with controlled calm and practiced dignity. Jennifer gets up immediately, no hesitation or restraint. Molly lingers, taking her time, refusing to bend to the will of her grandmother. 

Susanna huffs at her granddaughter as she passes through the heavy metal door. She walks over to the lift and raises the gate. Molly pauses in front of me and smiles. “Tell Justin I love him, okay?” She says with a bright smile. I smile at her and nod. She hugs me and I tense, unprepared for the show of affection. She lets me go and smiles at me before walking to the lift and getting inside. 

I look at Jennifer, huddled in the corner and looking so small. Susanna closes the gate and presses the down button. I watch as the lift disappears before sliding the door closed and taking a deep breath. 

Close your eyes and count backwards from five.

I lean against the door and close my eyes, taking in the silence. After a few seconds I push away from the door and start toward the bedroom, stripping out of my clothes as I walk. I let my body fall into bed and as sleep washes over me, I smell the water.

**

Cast your secrets into me and watch them dissolve.

I step up to the water and squat down, watching as the ripples wash over my shoes, getting them wet. I put my journal down in the grass to my right and hold my sketchpad in two hands. I open to the first page and come face to face with Molly. She is young in the sketch, immature, a pain. I rip the picture out and place it in the water, watching as the current carries it away. She is different now.

I turn page after page, ripping out all the pictures and casting them into the water. None of them are accurate. None of them tell the true story. My fingers stop on the picture of Brian. The first one I drew of him. I let my hands cast a shadow over the image as my fingers fold and bend the edges, debating.

Finally, I rip the picture out and cast it into the moving water. Brian is not the same person he was that day, because I am different. He is not the same. He is so much better… and so much more.

The past is set in concrete, unchangeable. The future… is infinite.

* * *

Thanks guys for all the reviews.


	23. Rose Water

Thank you to my beta Carly and also a big ass thank you to Carrie for helping me work out the kinks.

* * *

Time can pass quickly when your attention is somewhere else; when you are unconsciously focused on something that, ultimately, is beyond your control. I shut down my computer, walk out of my office and out of the front door. I don’t speak to anyone. I don’t have to. 

Actions speak louder than words.

I get in my car and move through the traffic. “What the fuck are you doing?” I ask myself as my building comes into view.

What am I doing? Rushing to get Justin, caring about someone else? I am not really sure and really, does it matter? All that matters, in the grand scheme of it all, is that I am doing exactly what I want to be doing. I park my car and get out, not bothering to wait for the lift to take me the few stories up to my floor. I can walk it. 

I place my foot on the landing and stop dead in my tracks. I come face to face with Michael’s back. His hand is getting ready to deliver an echoing bang around the loft.

Sometimes… in the midst of it all, a friend can send you falling faster than your greatest enemy. Release me without letting go.

“Brian, I was just about to knock,” he says as he spots me standing at the top of the stairs. I take the few steps toward him, closing the gap between the stairs and my door.

“What are you doing here?” I don’t have time for long division. Show me a shortcut. He talks on and on about how I have not been out. I don’t want to be. How I have not gone to family dinners. I don’t want to go. How I have not called him in a while. I don’t have anything to say. 

He talks and talks and in the end… he says nothing.

“I am just worried about you,” he tells me. His hands are in his pockets, no doubt flexing in and out, waiting for me to apologize, to consent to a dinner and a night out with the guys. I have better things to do. 

“Don’t be, I’m fine.” I move past him, forcing my key into the lock and sliding my door open. He follows me in and waits for us to continue our conversation. But he is not Jack, and I am not eight years old. I hook my arm around his neck after turning off the alarm. 

He smiles up at me, happy and content with our current position until he feels the pressure on his neck as my arm starts to lead him back around. 

“Sorry Mikey, but, you have to go,” I tell him as I deposit him on the other side of the door. He slouches and his whole body reflects his disappointment.

“Why, you have some trick coming over?” I could answer him, but I don’t. Instead I smile as my hand taps out my frustrations against the door handle. The metal holds onto a soft disturbed sound, like billboards in a harsh wind. They cry out for you to see them, know them and feel them. 

Inanimate reflections of human emotions.

“Goodbye Mikey.” I slide the door closed and close my eyes for the briefest of moments. Focus. I move away from the door and walk up to the bedroom, stripping out of my suit as I move. I hang the suit up and get into the shower.

The heated illusion of therapy.

I move through the streets, my legs covered in soft denim and my arms hugged by leather. The black shirt that plays on my skin is virgin, the dye rich and waiting. I am moving toward certain death. I am moving toward more life than I have ever known. I am moving toward… uncertainty.

Cast me into the sun.

**

It all belongs to me.

Love... is only as good as you make it. Happiness… is a monumental achievement. Hope… is needed. Desire… is romantic. Despair… is tiring. Sadness… forms a chokehold. Hate… is blinding. Sacrifice… is altruistic… and selfish. Education… comes from more than four walls and books. 

Anything… can change. Everything… is open to personal interpretation, everything. Fear… is a kaleidoscope. Life… is more than breathing. Death… is inescapable, but sometimes in the midst of it all…

Sometimes a friend… is all you need.

I walk back through the woods, my heart, head and hands empty. “Why’d you do that?” I jump back immediately at the sound of the voice. 

“Fuck,” I say as I take a step forward. “Freddy, you scared the shit out of me,” I tell him as I walk along the pathway. He falls into place behind me, kicking rocks and sticks from in front of his path. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to spy,” he says smugly. 

“Right.” I roll my eyes and pull the sleeves of my shirt down around my hands. Freddy jogs a little, until he is standing right next to me. He reaches out a hand and stops my progress. “I have a boyfriend,” I tell him. I relish the ease in which that rolls off my tongue and the balls I have to use the word.

“I have a daughter,” he counters. I turn to look at him and cross my arms, tucking them in tight to my body. It is not winter but the cool air from the other night is still lingering in the air. “I’m sorry about the other day. I just, I don’t know, got caught up in my emotions. It should not have happened and I’m sorry.”

I want to tell him to fuck off, but I don’t. Instead I turn from him and keep walking. I spot a cement bench and head straight for it, parking myself on the cool stone. Freddy sits next to me, his hands in his pockets.

“It’s okay,” I say to him. He looks up at me with confusion in his eyes. “About before I mean, its okay.” He lets himself smile but it does not look self-satisfied it looks… relieved. 

“I thought you weren’t going to forgive me, but Melvin said to try anyway.” I let out a small chuckle at the thought of Freddy and his counselor, Melvin, talking about me. “He told me to just be honest.”

“They all say that. They all want us to be honest. I don’t know why, maybe we are like their personal real life soap operas.” Freddy looks around and pulls a cigarette out of his pocket, along with a lighter. “Where did you get that?” I ask. 

“I took it out of my mother’s purse the last time she came to visit. I doubt she even noticed it was gone, the bitch,” Freddy says with a laugh. He lights the cigarette and offers it to me. I gladly take it, my fingers welcoming a position along the white tobacco paper. I take a deep pull and hold it in for as long as I can before releasing it into the air. 

“So,” he asks me as I pass the cigarette back to him. He taps my colored bracelet with his free hand. “What are _you_ in for?” 

The bracelets are color-coded, but most of us are too busy dealing with our own pain, our own color, to be bothered with the meaning of anyone else’s. Self-preservation.

“Don’t you listen in group?” I ask Freddy.

“Do you?” Freddy smiles when he sees the look on my face. No one in group listens, except for Gerri.

“I cut myself,” I say without emotion. Freddy gets off the bench and swings his leg over, straddling the cement, facing me.

“No shit, I’ve never roomed with a cutter before. Doesn’t it hurt? It has to hurt.” I move back on the bench a little and fold my legs under my body, facing him. I have never bothered to know too much about anyone else, never cared, but now… now I figure having a friend might not be so bad, even if his tongue was down my throat the other day.

“No, it feels… better,” I say. Freddy nods, telling me without telling me that I don’t have to say anything else. He understands. “So,” I say as I take the cigarette from him. “What are you in for?”

Freddy shifts a little and looks over at the clinic before looking back at me. “I have to pick just one?” He asks with a laugh. “Alcohol and sex mainly, they are an _oh so deadly_ combination, ya know?” Freddy laughs some more and takes the cigarette from me. He takes one last pull and watches as the burning tip disappears into the filter.

I have decided that I like Freddy. Freddy is not as big a dick as I thought he was. Okay, he is but now I like him so he’s okay. 

“They put you in rehab for sex?” I ask. Freddy nods and scratches at the hair on the base of his neck, a nervous habit that I have already noticed has.

“HA, yeah, they do if you are a diagnosed sex addict,” he says. I nod my head and watch as he reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a folded picture. “That’s Ally, my daughter. She’ll be four in December and I have only seen her a few times since this picture was taken, and I was barely standing on my own two feet then. I was so drunk. I can remember it like it happened five minutes ago.” 

Freddy stares at me, his lips moving without his brain as his right hand plays with the bracelet on his left arm. “What happened?” I ask cautiously.

Jim is not everyone’s best friend. Some people run from him, hard, and fast. Others love his burn.

“It was her second birthday and Tracy, that’s her mom, had finally saved up enough money to buy her a birthday cake. We didn’t have any money then, we were just two stupid sixteen year olds with a kid. I got angry, I don’t remember why but I do remember spending the money for the birthday cake on alcohol. Tracy wouldn’t even yell at me, she just picked up Ally and left. I passed out on the floor.” Freddy let himself come back to the present and look at me.

“Well, at least you’re in rehab now,” I say. I don’t know what else to say.

Everyone is smoke and mirrors.

“Yeah, well, this ain’t my first time… and honestly, I don’t think its going to be my last.” I don’t say anything. I just sit there, too stunned to talk. I never thought of Freddy as a real person with problems. I never thought of Freddy at all. 

“Yeah, well, it’s going to be mine,” I say as I unfold my legs and get up off the bench. Freddy puts the picture back in his pocket and gets up too. We walk back to the clinic together, talking about nonsense and trivialities. Simplicity.

**

Fast forward into my future. Stop, and wait for me.

“Are you excited?” Gerri asks as I sit in her office, my feet propped up on the coffee table. That’s a stupid question. Why wouldn’t I be excited?

“Not especially,” I tell her. She looks at me, waiting for more. Always leave them wanting more. I look at her and sigh. I re-adjust my feet and prop my sketchbook and journal up higher on my lap. My fingers tap on the front of the hardened cardboard. Nervousness.

“I mean, I am happy to be leaving… if that’s what you mean. But, excited, I don’t know,” I tell her. I don’t want her to know that I am excited. That the thought of seeing Brian when I wake up makes me so excited I could die and be happy about it. She doesn’t need to know that. 

“It’s okay to feel a little confused about leaving.” I did not say I felt confused. I cross my arms over my chest and stare at her. “But just remember, you’re not alone out there. You are going to be seeing Marc and you have Brian and your other friends.”

“Yeah,” I say. I am leaving in an hour. She can assume she knows everything about me for all I care. My time here is over. I feel… exactly the same, and completely altered. She talks to me about all the progress I have made. I can’t eat without supervision. I can’t shave without someone watching me. I was lucky to have gotten the pencil to draw with. 

Yeah, I feel so lucky. Liberate me. Set me free and watch me die.

I walk out of Gerri’s office and head straight to my room. I close the door behind me and start to pack my bags. I pack as fast as I can, not really wanting anything. Freddy opens the door and walks in, flinging the door closed behind him. “Hey,” he says as he tosses his journal on his bed and flops down, crushing it beneath his body.

“Hey,” I say as I move into the bathroom. I make sure I take everything. I am not coming back. I walk back into the bathroom and dump all the toiletries into my duffel bag; One duffel bag. My whole life zips up. 

“You don’t feel any different do you?” Freddy says as he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a cigarette. He lights it with his mother’s lighter and takes a deep pull. I zip up the duffel bag and carry it over to the door, dropping it down to the floor. 

I stand at the side of Freddy’s bed, waiting. “They tell you that you are cured when you walk out that door. It’s all bullshit.” He stands up and looks at me, his eyes bleeding into mine.

Freddy wraps his arms around me, the smoke wafting up and circling us like secrets. “You don’t get to be cured. You are what you are. It lives in here,” he says as he pulls out of the embrace and taps at my chest. “You can’t run away from it. No matter how deep you bury it, it will always be there, lurking, waiting… for you to fuck up.”

“Then what are you supposed to do?” I ask quietly. He talks like he has all the answers, all the knowledge. 

“Know it,” is all he says before laying back on the bed and closing his eyes. The words swim inside my head. Know it… know it… know it. 

Knowledge is power. I hear the roar of a Corvette’s engine.


	24. Rose Water

AN: Thank you to my beta Carly.

* * *

When everything you thought you had falls apart, you have no choice but to move on. 

If you don’t, you’ll get trampled by the next wave of bullshit. You go on. You fall to the ground, pick yourself up and bite your lip against the tears that threaten to fall as you step into tomorrow, the sun shining on your face and blinding your way, stealing your eyesight.

I have turned my back on the sun. I welcome the darkness. My own private declaration. I blink as I feel the door press into my back. I turn around and come face to face with Gerri. 

“Justin, are you ready? Its time to go,” she says as if I am going to fight and protest. 

“I know,” I say as I lock eyes with Freddy. 

Pick up where you left off. I can’t, I lost my page. I’m breathing…

I’m breathing. I’m drowning. I’m…. “Shit Brian, you scared the fucking shit out of me,” I say as I open my eyes and sit up in the tub, wiping the extra water from my face. The walls of the hotel bathroom are yellow, stained, forgotten. 

Brian didn’t want to stop here; a small, cheap hotel that changes its customers too much and its sheets too little. He wanted to drive the few hours back to Pittsburgh. He wanted to get back into step, line up our lives and dive in. Synchronized swimmers. 

I need to change my routine.

“Hungry?” He asks as he looks at me. I can see the questions swirling inside of him, but he bites his tongue. I wipe the water from my face again, my hand grazing the hairs that have grown on my face. 

Cutters… Number one rule… No sharp objects.

“Yeah,” I say as I let my hand float just above the surface of the water. He looks at himself in the mirror, checking himself out, trying not to look at me. I smile inside of myself as he tries to ignore the elephant in the room. My left hand is resting on the side of the tub. I shake it a little, just slightly. Peanuts.

Don’t feed the animals.

“What do you want?” He asks as he turns to me, the top button of his jeans undone as they ride low on his hips. “That is, _if_ there is even a decent place around here to order from.”

“Pizza,” I say. He walks out of the bathroom and I know that he is going to get Thai. I notice he left the door open, but I don’t say anything as I slide back under the water. 

Hold your breath.

**

I don’t trust you enough to let you trust yourself.

I leave the bathroom door open. I need to see him. I have to know that he’s okay. I have to. I know that I can’t watch him every minute of everyday, hour, month, week, second, year… years and it scares the shit out of me. “Yeah, that’s the right address,” I say into the phone. 

I hang up as I watch the faint bubbles of air float to the surface of the water in the tub. 

I pick up my cell phone, tapping it roughly against my leg before pressing number four on the speed dial list. “Hell-O,” Cynthia sings as she answers the phone. I toss Justin’s jacket onto the chair in the room and lean against the headboard. 

“Cynthia,” I say as I clear my throat. 

“Brian?” she says. I can hear her rustling papers and I smile. She must still be at work. Cynthia does more than she has to. I make a mental note to raise her pay… or, buy her something. 

“Well, who did you think it was? Look, I need you to clear my schedule,” I tell her as I pinch the bridge of my nose. I can hear her breath hitch as more papers rustle in the distance. 

“Brian, you have meetings lined up with….”

“I _know_ who I have meetings with,” I say as Justin’s head emerges from under the water. “Cancel them all. Until further notice, I’m not available.” I hang up the phone, without giving her a chance to answer. There is a knock at the door and I get up to answer it, tossing my phone on the bed. 

“Kinney?” The deliveryman asks. I nod my head and hand him the money for the food along with a tip before closing the door. Justin comes out of the bathroom, water dripping from his body as he fastens his towel around his waist. 

“I fucking _knew_ you were going to get Thai,” he says as he walks over and sits on the bed. I sit across from him and lean on the headboard, my right leg resting on the floor. We talk as if we have known each other for a lifetime. We talk as if we are the closest that two people can ever be.

Public identity is a smokescreen.

“You know me so well,” I say as he takes out one of the containers, opens it and starts to eat. He is on his third bite, the chopsticks tapping cautiously against his lips when he decides to say what he is really thinking. 

Clear the air. 

“Well enough to know that you don’t trust me,” he says as he looks at me, his blue eyes burning into mine. I look at him, the noodles seeming to multiply in my mouth. I swallow and the stalemate begins. Who can last longer? Who has so much more that they don’t want to say? 

I stick my chopsticks in my noodles and sit the container on the nightstand. He wins. I cave. 

“ _Should I_ trust you?” I ask. 

He puts his hand down, his chopsticks tapping against his toweled thigh. He wasn’t expecting me to ask him that. I look into his eyes and I see them shift. I see his entire body shift. He’s uncomfortable. His eyes rest back on mine, but I can see the chopstick as the rhythm changes from a constant tapping to an unconscious digging. 

I reach out and take the chopsticks from his hand. 

“Should I?” I repeat. A single tear falls from his eye and over his cheek, soaking into the white towel that covers him. I take the container out of his hand and sit it next to mine on the nightstand. I wrap my fingers around his wrist and pull him closer to me. 

“I don’t know,” he whispers in my ear as he wraps his arms around me. “I don’t think I really trust myself.” I feel his mouth on my neck. I hold onto his arms, pulling him back so I can see his face.

**

Fuck me into nothingness. I want to swim in a sea of smoke. I want to choke on air. No questions. No thoughts. Nothing but… distorted reality.

I hold onto Brian’s back, my fingers digging into him, pulling him closer. Heated indentations on sweat drenched skin. I wrap my legs around his waist as my back arches off the sheets. I feel him enter me completely and I bite down on the skin of his shoulder. There will be marks there in the morning. 

My marks… on his skin. 

“Justin,” he breathes as I release my hold on him, my tongue soothing the burn. I bring my lips to his as he thrusts inside of me, our movements slow and timeless. 

“Ugh,” I grunt as I feel his hand grasp my cock. I suck in a deep breath as he pumps his fist up and down. He pumps as he thrusts and I feel my back slide across the sheets. My head falls over the edge of the bed and the rush of blood coupled with the other feelings is almost too much.

I hold onto Brian’s hair as I start to come, hard. He follows me, filling the condom and collapsing on top of me, our breathing shallow, hard, wanting, waiting, searching. I don’t move my legs. I keep them locked around his waist, holding him close to me. 

It’s been forever. It’s nice to meet you again.

He slides out after what feels like hours and moves to the side of me, an empty space between heaven and hell, propping his head up on his hand as he lights a cigarette and lets the smoke fill the room. “That was great,” he says as he licks his lips and takes another pull from the cigarette. 

Sugar-coated angel. I see the devil’s tail.

“Yeah,” I finally say. It’s the only word I can get my lips to form. I can still feel him pulsing inside of me. I close my eyes and let the sensations run through me. 

Rubber on black pavement in the harsh quiet of morning. Two hearts beating toward uncertainty. One mile… two… three… four… five… 

No detour. 

**

Back at the loft. A false sense of home. A modern day castle… spacious and cold… containing secrets known by all and hidden from the seeing.  
 _  
With your feet in the air and your head on the ground  
Try this trick and spin it, yeah  
Your head will collapse if there’s nothing in it  
_  
I watch him as I step around the bed, a manila folder held loosely between my fingers. 

The blinking of his eyes and the movement of his finger as he presses the repeat button on the stereo is the only movement he has made in the past few hours. “Are you just going to lie there all day?” I ask as I stop at the top of the stairs. 

His right hand flexes around the stereo remote as he stares up at the ceiling, his limbs stretched in each direction. Bondage re-enactment. 

His diploma is next to his head, teasing and taunting him. He didn’t go to his graduation. He was too depressed, too locked away. Too absent from caring. He wasn’t sorry he missed it. He wished he was there. “I’m thinking,” he says as he flexes his fingers around the remote. 

“Are you going to lay there _thinking_ all day?” He lifts his head and looks over at me before dropping his head back onto the pillows.   
_  
Where is my mind?  
Where is my mind?  
Where is my mind?  
Way out in the water, see it swimming  
_  
“It wouldn’t bother you so much if you were at work. You didn’t have to stay here and watch me,” he says as he listens to the song play. “Don’t bother denying it. I know you stayed just to make sure I wouldn’t slit my wrists while you were gone.” He presses the play button, starting the song over, again.

“That’s not funny.”

“I’m not laughing.”

 

**

One week, five hours, thirty minutes, seven seconds. I hear a ticking time-bomb.   
_  
“You don’t get to be cured. You are what you are. It lives in here,” Freddy says to me as he taps my chest.  
_  
I blink away the memory. Decaying flowers on a forgotten grave.

“I’ll have my cell on,” he tells me. I nod my head. He has told me that five times already. I reach up and kiss him. His hands grip my arms, steadying me? Steadying himself? “Later,” he says as he leaves out of the door, closing it behind him. The vibrations shake the foundations of my body. 

“Later,” I breathe.

I am waiting to see if I’ll collapse, fall apart and crumble now that I am out from under his watchful eye. Brian watched every movement I made, careful to not let me see him doing it. I turn around and walk away from the door. 

First step, take a shower.

I pull my jacket on and sling my backpack over my head, the strap resting across my torso. “Take a deep breath. You’ll be fine,” I tell myself as I slide the loft door open and step into uncertainty. 

Second step, leave the loft. Try to exist outside the realm of the self-proclaimed sacrosanct.

I walk out of the front of the building and look up and down the street. There are people everywhere. I thought that most people would be at work all ready, deserting the sidewalks and leaving then open to me. 

I step down from the stoop and head toward the bus stop, my left hand clutching tightly to the strap of my bag. I sit at the bus stop, my right foot gently tapping the ground. I watch the people as they walk up and down the street oblivious to all that is going on around them. 

Someone sits next to me on the bench, a little too close for comfort. I want to move, but I don’t want to be that asshole that moves because they didn’t want to sit next to you in the first place. No one likes that person. Everyone knows when they are being that person. If this was the movie theatre this would be next to unacceptable.

Courtesy seat BITCH!

“Do you go to school around here?” I shift my eyes and look at the woman sitting next to me. Dark blue jeans, black tank top, hair pulled back lazily into a bun, she smiles at me. 

“Huh?” She laughs and tugs on the strap of my backpack.

“You look like a student,” she says. “I teach art and sculpture over at PIFA, so I see enough of them.” I give her a fake smile as I move a fraction of an inch. She gives me a smirk and smiles, showing all of her teeth. “Its okay, you can move over if you want. Most people say I tend to make them feel a little… claustrophobic. 

Now I can’t move. Fuck her open invitation.

“No,” I tell her. She watches me, her head nodding as she looks me up and down. “I applied to PIFA,” I tell her as my eyes keep a steady lock on the windows of the building across the street. 

“Cool, did you get in?” She asks as she gazes at me, her eyes never moving from mine. I refuse to look over at her. I refuse to meet her stare head on. I kick my legs out in front of me; pitch black Converse covered by worn denim. 

“I don’t know. I never opened the letter,” I say as the clouds move and let the sun shine through. I inch my feet back, not wanting the light to touch me. 

“Why not?” 

I shrug. “I don’t know. I think I always meant to, but I just got a little… distracted.” I adjust my jacket and pull on the strap of my bag. She is making me pleasantly nervous. Almost like she is a part of me; some part that I lost long ago. 

“Well,” she asks as she digs in her pocket, “what’s stopping you now?” She pulls out a handful of gummy bears and puts one in her mouth, offering me one. I shake my head when I see her hand holding the sticky bears in my peripheral vision. 

“No thank you,” I say. She looks up at the sky, shrugs her shoulders and pops another one into her mouth. “I think I am afraid of what I’ll do if I wasn’t accepted.”

“I see,” she says as she turns on the bench. “Well, I say… fuck fear.” Her knee is pressing into my bag, making it press into me. I move over a little and rub the itch on my nose away. Now I lock eyes with her. Now I let her see me. I move my bag over to the other side of my body and turn toward her.

Her eyes are slate grey, piercing. Her hair is jet black, haunting. She can’t be more than twenty-eight. I see the large art portfolio behind her, resting against the bench. I see the art box on the ground, sitting at her feet and waiting. Charcoal stains are peppering her hands and fingers. She is gorgeous. 

“What if you say fuck you to fear, step off of the curb and get hit by an eighteen wheeler?” I ask. She eats another gummy bear as she stares at me. 

Finally, after countless ticks of the second hand she opens her mouth. “What if you make it to the other side? The point is…” 

“Justin,” I tell her. 

“The point, Justin, is that you have to step off the curb to find out what’s going to happen. No matter the outcome, at least you’ll know that you had the balls to go for something that you wanted so bad that you were willing to put it all on the line.”

I look at her as she reaches into her pocket and pulls out a card. She scribbles on the back and hands it to me. Charcoal stains smudging the writing. “Leslie Nurella,” I read. 

“Yeah, that’s me,” she says as the bus pulls to a stop in front of us. I didn’t even hear it coming. She gets up and grabs her things. “Call me when you open the letter, or even if you don’t. I like to get together with other artists and just hang out.”

“How did you….” She leans over and taps on my fingers. I look down and see the paint, charcoal and granite marks from my own work glaring back at me. She gives me another huge smile and hops onto the bus, waving as she sits down and they pull away.

Newly enlightened. Smothered in diesel exhaust.

I pull my backpack in front of me and flip the flap open, searching for the papers I abandoned so long ago. I reach the bottom of the bag and my fingers graze against the envelopes. I pull them out one by one, no longer concerned with a backup plan or my father’s choice. 

I toss the others aside and stare at the PIFA envelope, heavy and hot in my hand. Stationary bullet. 

I rip into the envelope, my teeth clamping down on my bottom lip. My eyes scan over the date, the name of the school, the address, blah… blah… blah. I stop on the first line. I don’t need to go any further than that. I don’t need to see anything more than…   
__  
We are pleased to inform you….  
  
I just stepped off the curb.

* * *

The lyrics are to the song Where is my mind? by The Pixies


	25. Rose Water

Thanks to Carly, the awesomest beta there ever was.

* * *

I have stopped short of absolution by fire, diving deep enough to feel the heat but not burn. I don’t feel changed. I don’t feel cured. I don’t feel anything but the same. I have to wonder if this is what clarity feels like. Does it feel like weightlessness? 

“I registered for six classes,” I say as I drop my schedule onto Brian’s desk. 

He looks up at me and frowns. I tap on the schedule in front of him. “I opened my letter from PIFA today. I got in,” I tell him. 

“Congratulations,” he says as he watches me. My hands are gesturing and I am pacing back and forth in front of his desk, my backpack abandoned near the door, propped up against the wall.

“I went over there and registered. I just had to do it. I had to jump into the water,” I say as I stop pacing. My heart is beating fast. He is looking at me and I can see the pride in his eyes. “I had to step off the curb.”

“PIFA is a really expensive school. How are you going to pay for it?” He asks. I hadn’t thought about that before. 

I don’t know the answer to that question. I shrug hard and bite my bottom lip. He clears his throat and I automatically release my lip from between the crushing bone. Private Signal.

“I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it,” I say honestly. The fact that I did not have my parents to shoulder that burden had not registered in my brain. 

He nods as he looks at the classes that I have signed up for. “The advisor said that I could take more but I took the normal amount, at least for now.”

“I’ll pay for it,” he says. I stare at him for a minute. 

Did he just offer to pay my tuition for PIFA? I don’t want him to pay my way. I don’t want to hurt his feelings. I start to open my mouth. My lips part, the air cooling the saliva that dances along the insides of my mouth and I lightly gasp. 

“Brian….” I start to protest his announcement.

“It’s not that big a deal Justin. Think of it as… an investment,” he says as Cynthia walks in. 

“Brian, Folten called. He wants to arrange an emergency meeting for this afternoon,” she says before looking at me. “Hi, Justin. How’s school?”

“Hi, Cynthia,” I say. “I just registered actually.” I have liked his assistant from the moment I met her. She smiles at me as Brian looks over the papers that she handed him. 

“Really, aren’t you a little late?” She asks. I glance at Brian but his eyes never move from the forms he is looking over. I know he likes his privacy. So I smile. 

“Yeah, well, I had a few things that I had to work out first,” I tell her. She accepts this answer as Brian hands her the papers back. 

“Tell Folten to come on in. I’ll squeeze him in between meetings,” Brian tells her.

“You got it,” she says. “Bye, Justin.” She disappears from the office and goes to carry out Brian’s requests.

“I don’t want you to have to pay my tuition,” I say as I sit in the chair in front of him. He looks at me and threads his fingers together. 

“I’m aware of that, but right now you don’t have too much of a choice.” I know he is right. I know it. 

“Okay, but I am getting a job,” I say adamantly as I get up and grab my jacket and bag. 

I walk back over to the desk and look down at him. He looks at me, his tongue planted in his cheek. “Fine, if you want to slave away instead of taking advantage of my generosity I guess I can’t stop you.” 

“Thank you,” I say as I lean over his desk and kiss him firmly. 

The sweet taste of apprehension and anticipation.

**

I registered for Leslie’s class. It was filled to capacity but she let me in. I don’t know why. Sometimes people see in you the things that you cannot see inside yourself. I think that Leslie is like that. 

We turned in our first assignments the other day. 

She did not grade mine. Instead she put the dreaded ‘Please see me’ prominently on the top, in red letters. She could have bled on the paper critiquing a famous work of art and it would have been less noticeable. 

Time prolongs the healing of all wounds. I used to think that this wasn’t true. In fact, I thought exactly the opposite. But, the truth is that time only makes the healing easier to forget. The sore, the wound… still festers. Growing a scab or infecting you. One minute at a time. 

Hydrogen Peroxide induced state of emergency. 

“There is nothing more boring, or exciting, than predictability,” Leslie says as I stand in the threshold of the door to studio C. “Come on in.” I walk into the room, my sneakers making no move to protest the actions. 

I have never been in this studio before. It is for her advanced students.

Flecks of paint decorate the tabletops. Pencils, markers and brushes occupy the counters, easels and mason jars. It is art incarnate. Student’s renditions, feelings, thoughts and desires plague the walls, some moving slightly in a forgotten breeze, wanting to be noticed. 

“This place is incredible,” I say as I come to a stop in front of her, our bodies separated by a large table. She smiles at me but she doesn’t look around, giving a false sense of modesty. 

“Thanks,” she says as she points to my bag and jacket. “You can put that stuff down. I want to show you something,” she tells me with a smile. I pull my bag’s strap from over my head and shrug out of my jacket, placing both items on a stool. 

I walk over to her and stand, waiting. She grins as she grabs the ends of a white sheet that covers a large canvas, the paint stains on her fingers standing out against the bright background. 

She pulls the sheet off quickly and leans her head to the side. “Quick, tell me what you’re thinking right this instant,” she says in one breath. I hesitate and she shifts her head to the other side. “Don’t think about it, just say it.”

“The colors around the edges are overwhelming. They drown out the painting, leaving the middle unseen,” I say as I gesture at the painting, highlighting my thoughts and observations. 

“I think the colors around the edges pull you into the painting. I think they make you apart of it.”

“Like a person,” I say. She looks at me with amusement, wanting me to explain. “A person,” I say as I get closer to the painting, “has this light to them, it… draws you in. But, when you get really close you see the imperfections. You see the other colors that make them whole.”

“Is that a bad thing?” She asks as she puts the white sheet on the table and places her hands on her hips, looking at the painting. 

I think about her question. “No, but it changes depending on what angle you’re looking from.” She files that information away and nods her head. “You painted this,” I state more than ask. 

“Yeah, I did,” she says as she crosses her arms and looks at me. 

“So, did I see in the painting what you intended?”

“Nope, you saw what _you_ wanted to see. You saw what it meant to you,” she tells me as she walks over to the other side of the room and pulls out a medium sized canvas. She turns around and motions to me. “Come here.”

“What’s this for?” I ask as she presses the canvas into my chest. I wrap my fingers around the board and hold it tightly, staring at the white.

“I want you to paint me something. It doesn’t matter what it is before you ask,” she says as she looks into my eyes. Her black hair is pulled into a ponytail, tighter than the one she wore the other day. 

“I don’t have any paints.” I don’t look up at her. 

“You can use the ones in here. Use anything you want.”

“When do you want it?” I ask. 

“Monday,” she says before walking to the front of the room. 

**

It’s not my story to tell. I know that. I am an understudy. Memorizing the lines and waiting for my chance to take the spotlight, but for now… right now, content to just be a part of the play. 

Curtain call.

I collapse on top of him, my cock planted in him as we both come down from our orgasms. I finally slide out of him and pull the condom off, tossing it onto the floor. I’ll pick it up later. I move off of him and lay on my back, my hair clinging to my forehead. 

“You know. I think I may have taught you too well,” I say. He doesn’t say anything. He just smiles. He looks over at the canvas that he propped up against the wall. “You think too much,” I say as I get up and walk into the bathroom.

“One of my many flaws,” he says as I wash my hands and walk out of the bathroom, down the stairs and over to the kitchen. His eyes follow me as he sits, wrapped in ash gray sheets and still taking shallow breaths. 

I grab two bottles of water and walk back into the bedroom, stepping over discarded clothes. “And mine,” I admit freely. I toss the bottle of water at him and he holds it in his hands for a few seconds before twisting the top off and taking a long drink.

I lie back down next to him and pull a cigarette from off of the side table, lighting it up. “She wants me to paint something, by Monday,” he says as he bends his legs and rests his chin on the tops of his knees. 

“So, do it.”

“I can’t just _do it_ ,” he says. 

“Why not?” I ask as I take a pull from the cigarette and release the smoke slowly. He sighs and lies back down, staring up at the ceiling. 

“I don’t know what she wants.” 

“Why do you care what she wants?” I ask. “Paint what _you_ want.” I take another pull from the dwindling cigarette as he closes his eyes, sweat and cum still clinging to his skin. 

A thousand glances into my future and I still would have never seen it coming.

**

“See the plane daddy?” Gus asks as he runs up to me, his airplane clutched tightly in his hand. I pick him up, relishing the smell of the baby shampoo in his hair. Lindsay comes out of the kitchen. She has a new haircut. 

“Brian,” Mel says as she walks down the stairs and into the kitchen. One talk, one date and they were back in each other’s arms again. It was bordering on pathetic but for Lindsay’s sake I refrained from making any obscene comments… for the first forty-eight hours.

“Mel,” I say flatly. She smirks as she walks into the kitchen. 

“I’m glad you could make it,” Lindsay says. I had to cancel on her twice before. I knew she was pissed about it. 

“Yeah, me too,” I say to her as I kiss her on the lips, begging for her forgiveness. Gus taps the plane against my chest and I give him my attention, full and undivided as Lindsay goes back into the kitchen. 

Our time together is not interrupted again until Lindsay comes out of the kitchen over an hour later to announce that lunch is ready. “Where’s Justin? I was hoping he would come with you,” Lindsay says as she wipes Gus’ mouth.

“He’s working on a project for school. It’s due on Monday,” I say as I drink some of my wine. 

“That’s too bad. We were looking forward to seeing him,” Mel says and I know she means it. She likes Justin. She has liked him from the moment Lindsay introduced them. 

Lunch goes on. Time moves smoothly. “Nite sonny boy,” I say as Mel announces that it’s his naptime. I give him a kiss and he giggles. 

“Say goodnight to daddy,” Lindsay presses. 

“G’night daddy,” he says through his giggles as Mel carries him up the stairs. I look over at Lindsay and smile. She moves closer to me and leans her forehead on my shoulder quickly before she looks up into my face. 

I know what she wants before she even asks. “We want to have another one, Brian,” she tells me. I don’t look at her. Instead I fix my gaze on Gus’ airplane as I roll my lips into her mouth and nod slowly. 

“Okay,” I say, “when do you want it?” She looks at me and I turn my head to look at her. She wants to yell and scream but she is afraid that if she does the scene will fade from in front of her and she’ll realize it was nothing but a dream.

She lets her lips part twice as she considers her words. Finally, she starts to talk. “Are you serious?” She asks as a small smile starts to show on her face. 

“Yeah, why not,” I say. She hugs me tightly. 

**

I hold on tightly to the white canvas as I wait at the bus stop, staring into it. I shift my feet back and forth, dreading the long hours that I am about to spend in the studio, on a Saturday. I hear the bus before I see it. The screech of brakes and the smell of diesel fuel present themselves before the actual bus itself. 

I don’t look up as the bus comes to a stop in front of me. I grab my backpack and my canvas, clutching both tightly as the people file out of the bus. I move forward through the small crowd as I reach into my pocket and grab my money for the bus.

I count it once, twice, three times. I hate to get caught at the front of the line without the correct change. I move forward, stepping into the empty space in front of me. My body slams into the one in front of me.

I drop my bag to the ground and when I reach down to pick it up I catch the smell of apples. “Daphne,” I breathe out as I look up and stand slowly. A small smile is tainted on her lips and she looks like she might cry at any minute. 

“I missed you,” she whispers, the bus drowning out her voice. For a minute neither one of us knows what to do. We stand looking at each other. She cut her hair, not a lot but I can tell. 

“You cut your hair,” I say and she touches it; pulls on the end. 

“I cut my hair,” she says confirming my statement. She steps forward suddenly and wraps her arms around me. I wrap my arms around her body, holding her close. 

I don’t worry about the bus. I can catch another one.


	26. Chapter 26

  
Author's notes: This chapter has been a long time coming. I hope you like it. I'll try to be more concrete with the updating.  


* * *

On the surface it all looks normal. On the surface it is all okay. Keep up appearances. Fall apart in private.

I gesture towards the small coffee shop. “As good a place as any,” she says as I pull the door open, “I hope they have decent coffee.”

“Yeah.”

We always had something to say. The conversation never ended. I want that back. “I moved out,” she says quickly, shattering the silent standoff between us. “I moved out of my parent’s house.”

I smile. I have to.

“That’s great.” She looks nervous. I shift in my seat, the sounds of the people in the coffee shop around us muffled and light. 

She laughs tensely and locks her fingers together on the top of the table. “No, not really,” she says too fast. “I mean, it’s a really small place. My bedroom is practically in my kitchen and I think the neighbors might sell drugs. I’m not sure though. But….”

“It’s yours,” I finish for her. She looks up at me and the time falls away. We are little again, holding each other up against the world and praying for the strength to keep standing. She nods her head.

“Yeah, its mine,” she says. We leave the coffee shop and walk, hand in hand down the sidewalk, our memories pressing us forward. I love Brian. I knew I did the first time he looked at me. I have never felt more at ease than I do right now.

Emotional Cheater. Shame, shame, shame.

“You went to rehab.” I look at her, her cold fingers holding onto my hand. She doesn’t look at me. My step hesitates at her words but we press on.

“The greatest time of my life,” I say with a purposeful exhale of heated air. I watch it dissipate. “I never felt more open and connected with my “disease,” I tell her, emphasizing the quotation marks with my fingers.

“You’re better?”

“I’m out,” I clarify. She stops walking and looks into the large display window of a jewelry store. She presses deeply into my side as the sun starts to set and the air around us drops. 

“I’m not,” she whispers, taking a step toward the glass. I cross my arms and stare at the expensive pieces of jewelry. She takes a deep breath and the reflective surface bounces her tears back to me.

She dropped her mask. She lost the game. 

**

“How did that make you feel?” Marc asks. I sit in his oversized chair, trying to drown him out. I don’t want to talk. I don’t want to feel anything. Fuck recovery.

“What, my best friend holding my hand?” I just want him to be quiet. I just want him to be quiet and let me think. “It was a little cold and…”

“To be needed by someone.”

“I didn’t feel anything. I wanted to,” I tell him. I pull my legs into the chair and cross my arms on top of my knees. He stares at me and I stare at him.

“Why didn’t you? What stopped you?”

“It would have been a lie,” I say, my eyes following his as he sits across from me. I glance at my watch. Brian should be here soon. I need him to come. This session is probing.

“Why?” He asks.

I am devoid of feelings. I have no empathy. This is a cure? No, this is my survival. I…am going to die. I am going to die and I am not afraid. I am not afraid to die. Living…is another story.

“Why?”

“Why would it have been a lie? Why would it be so bad to feel needed by someone else?” Marc asks as he sits back. He wants to have all the answers. He wants to know it all. I know more than I want to. 

“You’re the doctor, you tell me.” I look out towards the window and let the silence dance around us. Marc is patient. He is way too patient. 

**

“So, what did the good doctor have to say today?” Brian asks, his right hand gripping the steering wheel lightly. I look straight ahead.

“He says that I am a remarkable study and am cured of everything. I never have to see him again and this last session was free,” I tell him. He turns the corner.

“Good, that’ll save me a couple hundred dollars a month,” is his only answer. I smirk. He’d pay double that amount. 

“How’s Gus?”

“Melanie and Lindsay want to have another baby.” I don’t answer. I look over at him and wait for him to speak. “I told them I’d do it.”

“Wow,” I let out, wishing that I had stayed silent. “That’s great. Gus is great and I’m sure he’ll love having a little brother or sister. Melanie had to have practically shit when you agreed.”

“She was slightly less pleased than Lindsay. She won’t be a fan of mine anytime soon.” He pulls to a stop in front of the loft and shuts off the engine. I move to get out of the car and he stops me. I don’t want to do this. Not now, not ever. Not on the street. I can feel my pulse crawling under my skin.

I need to breathe.

“Are you going to tell me what the doctor said?” Brian asks. I sit all the way back in the seat and look over at him. 

“He asked me how it felt, to be needed by someone. He gave me more questions than answers and I feel like I’m running in circles,” I tell him as I open the door and step onto the concrete. He follows me, our footsteps falling in each others shadow.

Time can pass and shadows can fade. Memories can suffer the same fate. Emotions run deep, long, lasting… forever. Everything is slowly falling together and quickly trying to fall apart. 

Sunrise…

Sunset…

“I like it,” Brian says, sitting to my side, a glass of Beam held in his hand. I frown as I look at the canvas in front of me. I look from the canvas, to him, and back to the canvas. I twirl my paintbrush around, tapping it against the pencil, held tightly in the same hand.

“There’s nothing there,” I say as I look at him with a frown. He leans into me, his lips ghosting against mine as he stares into me. I shift in my seat as my pulse responds to his closeness.

“I know,” he says as he presses his lips to mine. 

He pulls back, slowly bringing me with him as he stands and leads me into the bedroom. I follow; the brush and pencil still in my hand. He pushes me down on the bed, making quick work of my jeans. I stare at the ceiling as his hands play over my body.

I detach as he slides into me. 

I detach and I can feel… everything. I exhale as the brush and pencil drop from my hand. I hold onto Brian’s hips as he thrusts into me, suspending me in oblivion. “Ugh,” I whimper. I can barely hear it. I hold onto Brian, my bottom lip held tightly between my teeth.

“Justin,” he calls as his movements still and he fills the condom inside of me. I feel my muscles tense as I follow him, exhaling sharply as I fall back into reality. He rolls to my side and my hand finds its way to my sweating skin, my fingers resting on my taunt muscles.

“That was great,” Brian says as he stares up at the ceiling. I move closer to him on instinct, our skin barely touching. 

“MmHm.”

**

I could watch Justin forever.

I watch him. “Do you think I’m too damaged?” He asks suddenly. I inhale the sex from the air. I think long and hard before answering. He doesn’t press.

“Yes.” I light a cigarette and shrug. “”But hey, who isn’t.” He looks over at me and locks his eyes to mine. I expect him to say something, anything. Instead he smiles. 

“I’m starting to think that maybe I want to be.” He gets up from the bed and walks into the bathroom. I listen to the sounds of water running.

A shot of Beam; another hit of nicotine. Rock-a-bye baby.

He paints all night. I leave him to it, walking around the loft and him. I pick up the proofs for our latest campaign and bury myself in work. Babylon is for another night, another time. I feel uneasy.

I can hear his voice coming from behind the canvas, low and purposeful murmurs. “If it starts to talk back I’d be worried.” He laughs as his hands fly over the white. He moves frantically. 

I leave him in the living room in front of the canvas. I hate the smell of paint.

**

5:23 in the morning. I listen to the faint sound of Brian breathing. I light a cigarette as I look at the finished painting, flecks of paint stuck to my skin. I step back from the canvas and take a long pull from the cigarette.

You look from your angle, I’ll look for mine.

I walk into the studio and sit the canvas on the desk, dropping my portfolio. Leslie looks up at me, her long black hair falling over her shoulders. “Justin,” she says with softened surprise, “I was sure you would be avoiding me.” 

“Why?” I ask. She walks from behind her drawing table and stops in front of me. “You said the painting was due on Monday. It’s Monday, here I am.”

“Yes, it is and yes you are.” She turns toward the covered canvas and smiles, crossing her arms. “Are you ready to show it to me?”

“No,” I answer. “If I had my choice I’d never show it to you. I’d never show it to anyone.”

“Not even yourself?” I shift my weight and look at her, directly in the eyes. She stares back at me. Brian is the only other person who has ever looked so deep. She makes me nervous.

“Least of all me,” I say. 

She blinks, a small smile pressing against her lips. She gestures towards the painting. “Okay, enough talking. Let’s see it.” I step forward and pull the cover from the painting. She makes no movement, no sound. I expect nothing from her. I want nothing from her. 

I _need_ nothing from her. 

“Well?” I ask after fifteen minutes of silence. She leans forward. I cross my arms over my chest.

“Do you really care?” She asks. She thinks I am asking her because she asked me. I hold my arms tighter around me and look out the large windows, perfect for light.

“No, not especially,” I say as I watch the light dance through the panes.

“Then why did you ask?”

“You expected me to.”

“You didn’t want to paint the painting.”

“No.”

“But you did.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because I had every reason not to,” I tell her. I turn to look at her as she keeps her eyes locked on the painting, a prism portrait faded in hues of black, red and living.

“Destroy it,” she tells me. 

“Destroy it?” She turns to look at me and her eyes are heavy.

“It is too beautiful, too complicated,” she surmises and her eyes burn into mine, a cold white heat. She turns away from me and walks back around her desk, sitting back on her stool. I turn to look at my painting. “Unless of course, you have the balls to let it exist.”

She’s talking about the painting. I’m thinking about me. My pulse is shaking. 

I can taste blood.


	27. Chapter 27

  
Author's notes: Big thanks to my beta Carly. Thank ya much. Sorry for the long ass break between chapters guys. I personally blame THE MAN.   


* * *

If it was cut and dry it wouldn’t be life.

You thought you learned your lesson the first time. You thought it was all crystal clear. It wasn’t and you honestly are starting not to care. You thought you had become enlightened. You bared your soul, but not quite. You went to the edge of hell and back again. No burns or smoke inhalation. 

Cheat death once, let out a sigh. Cheat death twice, shame on life. Cheat death three times. You might just slip away. 

It feels like old times, the long stretch of silence and way too much time. The box cutter is heavy in my hand, my thumb flicking the blade in… and out. Pulse. Pulse. Pulse. Sedation.

I choose destruction. Because I am weaker than I thought I was and because I am stronger than I never needed to be. Because it is not enough and because it is more than it ever had the right to be. Because it was mine to create. 

Because it is mine to destroy. This is my trial and error. I owe explanations to no one. Pulse. Pulse. Pulse.

I drop to my knees and press my palms to the floor. My breathing is shallow and mute. I thought I would be sad. I’m not. 

The painting is in pieces around me, the canvas mutilated and abused. I’d do anything to put it back together. But I can’t, I can’t put it back together. The air around me is stale and way too hot. The heater doesn’t work, I can’t turn it down.

I haven’t seen Brian in fourteen days. 

I walked out of Leslie’s studio and never looked back. I didn’t even think to wait for Brian to come, wait for the bus. Wait for my head to clear and my thoughts to reattach with my actions. I walked. I walked until my lungs burned and the painting was too heavy. 

Then I stopped.   
_  
“Justin, what the fuck are you doing here?” Daphne asks. I’ve been here for hours, leaning against the door and resting my head against the wall. I stand up, my back pressing against the wall as I will away the pins and needles._

_I don’t know why I’m here. I wish I could tell you, I can’t._

_“You think I could stay here for a few days?” I ask, biting my bottom lip and waiting for her answer. She jiggles the keys in her hand and smiles as the metal touches the lock._

_“Pizza for dinner sound good to you?” She asks as she pushes the door open and walks in. I pick up the canvas and follow her inside.  
_  
I have been here ever since. I haven’t left. I don’t need to. Daphne comes and goes. I sit back and take a deep breath, the apartment coming back into focus. Daphne wasn’t kidding when she said it was small. It defies the laws of physical space. 

I move back until my back is pressed against the wall and my feet are flat on the floor. The box cutter is pulsing in my hand and I feel the tears as they start to fall from my eyes. I choke back the tears as I reach for the cordless phone. I hold onto the phone, feeling the weight in my hand. 

Brian’s number replays over and over in my head. 

**

I pick up the phone on the fourth ring, drops of water still dripping from my skin and pooling on the floor. “Yeah,” I answer. I wait for the person on the other line to say something, anything. All I hear is silence.

You have five seconds.

I haven’t seen Justin in fourteen days. I don’t know where he is. He has dropped off the face of the earth and I can hardly breathe… on the inside. On the outside I have never looked calmer. 

“Justin?” I sit down on the bed and wait. I hear the moving of clothes and the pure rush of air. I can hear the sharp intake of tear-filled breath and the deafening silence of the dial tone.

If you’d like to make a call, please hang up and try again. 

**

“Justin?” I hear and I open my mouth. I open my mouth and nothing comes out, my tongue doesn’t move. I need a drink of water. I want to tell him where I am but I don’t. I press end and gently sit the phone down between my legs. 

I sit up on my knees and pull my bottom lip between my teeth, clicking the blade out and into place as I frantically pull on the button of my jeans. I rip open the zipper and close my eyes as metal meets flesh. Suddenly the heat doesn’t seem so bad. 

I welcome the cold. 

Cheat death four times, he might just call your bluff. No rest for the persistent. 

**

I pull my shirt down and walk across the loft, my right hand holding tight to the cordless phone. He’ll call back. This is his story, not mine. 

I reach into the fridge and pull out a bottle of water. I close my eyes and will away the tension in my shoulders as a loud pounding on the door pulls me from my thoughts. Reluctantly I place the phone on the counter. 

Wireless connection; local area network undetected.

I pull the door open and take a step back. “Hey, Brian,” Daphne says nervously as she smiles and walks through the door. I smile at her softly and close the door behind her. She drops her purse onto the sofa and her body quickly follows. “I was hoping you were home,” she says.

I walk into the kitchen and grab an extra bottle of water out of the fridge… and the phone. I hand the water to her and sit down on the other side of the sofa, the phone on the table in front of me. “Thanks,” she says as she twists off the top and takes a long drink. 

“You look good,” I tell her and I mean it. She looks better than the last time I saw her, covered in bruises and humiliation. She smiles and puts the top back on the water before holding it tightly in her hands, the condensation leaving small drops of water to fall on her jeans. 

“Thanks,” she says as she looks out the window at the day passing us by, fading into night. We don’t know what to say. We have come too far to dredge up the past and the future is too clouded. She knows what I want to say and I can feel her thoughts. 

“I’m sorry,” I tell her. For not coming to visit her, for not doing any of the things that I maybe should have done. I’m sorry. 

“Me too,” she says as she looks over at me, pushing loose strands of hair behind her ear and smiling. For not calling and telling me that she was okay. For not doing all of the things that she should have done. She’s sorry.

I nod and so does she. Build a bridge over the water, its way too deep to get wet.

“Has he been there the whole time?” I ask without looking at her. She rolls the water bottle in her hands and nods her head. 

“Yeah,” she says. I run a hand over my face and clench my jaw. “I didn’t know you didn’t know. I should have called. But, I was afraid that he would know I was talking to you and leave. I figured he was better off with me than on his own.”

I didn’t know she lived alone.

“Did he say anything?” I ask as I take a drink of my water and glance at the phone. She shakes her head. 

“He doesn’t talk much. He spends most of the time looking at this painting of his. I bought him a few pairs of sweats and a pack of tee shirts. He would have been pissed if I came to get clothes from here.”

“I’ll pay you back,” I tell her absently. 

“You don’t have to.”

“I’ll pay you back,” I repeat. She nods. Why are you here now? Why now? She reaches forward and puts her bottle on the coffee table. 

“I don’t know how worried you’ve been about him,” she starts. She has no idea. “But he doesn’t eat. I don’t know what to say to him… or do. I have a hard enough time pulling myself through the day.” 

She can’t carry him too. I understand. “I just can’t….” She stops talking. She pulls at a piece of her hair and sighs. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a white sheet of paper. “I’d lock my car,” she says as she pulls a key from her ring, “if I was you. It’s not the best of neighborhoods.”

I don’t need to open the paper to know it’s her address. I don’t need to feel the key in my pocket to know its there. I don’t need to know that I left her in my loft with two twenties and the number to the pizza place around the corner. I don’t need to hear the sounds that bounce off the walls of Daphne’s apartment building. 

I don’t need to know how much time passed between my presence in the lobby and my presence in front of the door. I knock twice.

This is your salvation; would you like to let it in?

“Open the door,” I say calmly. My insides are shaking. Having him in front of me is fourteen days overdue. I haven’t gotten decent sleep. Not because I can’t sleep without him, but because I can’t sleep while I am worrying about him.

I hear a muffled noise and a low, steady, voice. “Open the door Justin. I know you’re in there,” I say, my face pressed close to the door. I watch, out the corner of my eye, as one of Daphne’s neighbors walks down the stairs behind me. I pull the key from my pocket and stick it in the lock. 

I close the door behind me and slide the key back into my pocket. I take a step forward and look around the room. It doesn’t take long to take it all in. There is a place to eat, a place to sleep, a bathroom and no sign of Justin. Pieces of the painting, the one I had watched him painstakingly paint, lay on the floor surrounding my feet. 

I step over the pieces of canvas, torn strips, long and short. It wasn’t meant to be. “Go away.” His voice is too low, too tired, blocked and muffled by the bathroom door. Exhaustion.

“If only it was that easy,” I say as I lean against the door, the fingers of my right hand tapping against the door frame. My left hand loosely twists at the knob. It’s locked.

Don’t shut me out. 

I can hear him breathing. I can hear him thinking. I can’t touch him. I can’t hold him. I can’t reassure him and take it all back. Take it all away. I let out a slow, heavy breath. I’m not sure I would if I could. I’m not sure if I could take another round. 

TKO.

I feel exhausted. I feel full. I feel too much regret. Regret is a dish best served icy hot. I run my hand along the door frame and close my eyes. I steady my lip as I slam my shoulder into the door. It doesn’t take much; the appearance of wood and safety.

Justin looks up at me and his hands are shaking, covered in blood, a slight bluish tint. “The strangest thing,” he says and his thoughts stop. He rolls his lips into his mouth and shifts in his spot on the floor. I drop to the ground.

The bill for the cleaners will be on pink paper with blue ink.

“You owe me for this,” I say and he smiles shakily. He smiles and it makes me want to disappear. He won’t look at me. 

I press my back against the door frame, half on the wall and half suspended in the free space of the door. I can see the box cutter in his hand, slicked in blood. 

“I thought it was everything but me,” he says, his bottom lip trembling as he reaches up to wipe the tears away from his face. He uses the back of his wrist. The blade is too close to his face. I listen. I have never paid more attention. “Its not,” he tells the tiles.

The blade flicks in and then out, moved down to his thigh and still too close to his skin. I move forward slowly and sit next to him. His jeans are pooled around his legs, one side higher than the other. 

Call the blood bank. It’s all going to waste. 

The bag for his clothes will be medicinal waste. 

**

I don’t feel the warmed metal slip from my hand. I don’t feel my body slice through the air as I lean against Brian. He pulls my jeans back up, the blood trickling and sticky, warm and cooling. I don’t feel my feet slide across the floor or my jacket being tossed over my shoulders. I don’t try to pull it on.

It’s cold outside. I haven’t been outside in fourteen days. “Try not to get blood on the seats,” Brian says. I slide into the car and let him close the door. He gets in and drives. He drives too far and too fast. 

Pittsburgh General Hospital, the parking spaces are too narrow. Drop me at the door.

“Just… stay. There.” He leaves me at the door of the emergency room and drives away. I stare at the concrete and pretend not to notice the people. I pretend not to hear the sirens and the voices.

**

The sign on the door is manmade and full of authority. His pants are scrubs and he walks slowly. We have no words. He stands next to me as I hand the nurse my credit card.

The charge for the visit is over one thousand dollars. Master the possibilities.

“Thank you,” he breathes. I look over at him and nod. I am angry, but not quite. I don’t want to be. I take the card and the copy of the bill. He follows me out of the hospital and the time never moved so fast or so slow. “Thank you,” he repeats as the tires move over the pavement.

I don’t answer. I move the car. There is blood on the leather. Tomorrow the car gets detailed. Justin slumps against the door and watches the lights go by. You’ve waited two weeks you can last a little longer. I pull up to the curb and shut off the engine, getting out of the car. 

I wait for him.

He moves slowly, his wounds stinging, the scrubs filtering small droplets of post traumatic stress release. The key to the front door of the building and a five digit security code.

Daphne isn’t here.  
Justin inches past me and comes to a stop in the middle of the room, halfway between the door and the bedroom. He is too scared to move on and too numb to turn around. 

Face your fears, it makes you human. 

The sun is gone and the skyline is whispering. _Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?_

I watch him smooth out a forgotten towel, one of his, not mine, on the sofa and sit down, watching the edges to make sure he is on the towel and nothing else. I walk into the kitchen, jerking out of my jacket and dropping it onto the counter. The sleeve is on the stove.

Burn me twice, shame on me.

**

Brian is gone for what feels like forever. I stay where I am, an overwhelming heat pressing in the bottom of my stomach. “It was just too beautiful. I saw it, and I watched it and… too beautiful,” I say and I’m rambling. 

“She gave me a choice and all I could think was ‘this is all too much’. I had this opportunity to walk away and I didn’t. She offered it to me, on a… humph,mm… on a, a canvas I guess and I just couldn’t.” I shake my head.

Brian walks in front of me. I see his jeans close up as he comes to rest in front of me. 

I watch him as he stretches forward. He sits a bottle of Beam on the coffee table. He sits a straight razor on the coffee table, blade open and taunting, gleaming and new. He sits a condom on the coffee table.

He sits back on the sofa and crosses his arms over his chest. My hands are clasped between my knees. I look over at him and he looks at me. He raises an eyebrow, no emotion on his face. I turn my attention back to the table.

Don’t fuck with the devil. He plays for keeps. 

Ante Up.

The house always wins.


End file.
